Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial

Mobile in the Confederacy

2012-02-18T19:23:00.005-05:00

Images of Mobile, Alabama. From Harper's Weekly:

After New Orleans, Mobile was the most important port on the Gulf coast for the Confederacy. When New Orleans fell in the spring of 1862, Mobile became the most important port on the Gulf coast.

There were a number of reasons for this port’s value. Mobile Bay was an embayment running in a north-south direction, with a narrow mouth at the south end, guarded by Forts Morgan and Gaines (which were both under construction at the beginning of the Civil War). The City of Mobile lay at the northern end of the bay. Any naval assault on the city would have to pass through the mouth, run the gauntlet past the forts, and then up the bay to the city. Two major river systems, the Tombigbee and Alabama Rivers, converged at Mobile and provided river access to the interior. Mobile itself had a foundery and ship building facilities, and upriver the City of Selma had additional industrial capability.

In addition, several major railroad lines linked Mobile to other parts of the Confederacy, and provided the main link between the eastern and western portions of the CSA. Mobile’s rail connections proved to be of immense military value to the Confederacy, enabling the movement of troops to critical areas where and when they were needed. Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg, when he was garrisoning Pensacola, Florida, considered the ability to easily move troops by rail between Mobile and Pensacola, “worth 3,000 men at each end.”

Mobile was among the last major southern cities to fall at the end of the war. Yet, this defeat had no influence on the ultimate outcome of the war, as by 1865 (when the city was taken), the war was already won by the North. If the city has been taken earlier in the war (say, in 1862), historians estimate that this would have ended the war much sooner than it ultimately did. Interestingly, it seems both northern and southern leadership acknowledged the importance of Mobile and Mobile Bay, but both sides did not allocate the military resources to take or defend the city.

Through much of the war, Mobile remained an important port for blockade running, bringing critically needed supplies into the Confederacy and distributing them to where they were needed.

Upcoming HRNM/CWN 150/Mariners' Museum Events for March 2012

2012-02-16T16:27:00.003-05:00

The Treason of Mary Louvestre After Hours Event at HRNM

March 8, 2012
6:00 P.M.

FREE

KICK OFF THE BATTLE OF HAMPTON ROADS WEEKEND AT HRNM!

Join in the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Hampton Roads. Dr. My Haley, widow of author Alex Haley, who helped write the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Roots, will speak about her new historical novel, The Treason of Mary Louvestre. This book is based on the true story of a former slave-turned-spy who provided detailed information about the CSS Virginia to Navy Secretary Gideon Welles during the American Civil War. In addition to Haley’s talk and book-signing, the Battle of Hampton Roads watercolor contest participants’ art will also be shown during this event.

For more information, please go to the Naval Museum homepage HERE.

2012 Civil War Navy Conference Full Schedule
(CWN 150 Bloggers Highlighted in Red)

Schedule courtesy of the Mariners' Museum and the Battle of Hampton Roads Website. For more information and conference rates, go to the weekend's website HERE.

Friday, March 9 at 7 p.m.

Award-winning Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer will present Victory Without the Gaud:
The Battle of Hampton Roads and the Transformation of Civil War Art.
Ferguson Center on the campus of Christopher Newport University
FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Saturday, March 10 at 10 a.m.

United States Naval Academy professor and Civil War Naval scholar Craig Symonds will present
The War Along the Atlantic Coast.
The Mariners' Museum
FREE with museum admission

Sunday, March 11at 10 a.m.

Local Virginia historian and preservationist John Quarstein will present his research for his latest book,
The Monitor Boys: The Crew of the Union's First Ironclad as well as information from his reissued work
CSS Virginia: Mistress of Hampton Roads.
The Mariners' Museum
FREE with museum admission

Saturday, March 10 Sessions
Search for and Discovery and Identification of the USS Monitor Wreck Aboard the R/V Eastward
Dr. Robert Sheridan, Professor Emeritus, Rutgers University

"Where's the Starboard Beam?" Commanding the Tin-Can From Inside an Iron Box
Francis DuCoin, Independent Historian & volunteer, USS Monitor Conservation Project

"Iron Coffin: War, Technology, and Experience Aboard the Monitor"
Dr. David Mindell, Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Frances and David Dibner Professor of the
History of Engineering and Manufacturing, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

A Brotherhood Adrift: Confederate Sailors
Laura June Davis, Doctoral Candidate, University of Georgia

"Sink the Merrimac!": Northern Plans, Schemes, and Inventions to Destroy the Rebel RamDr. David Gerleman, Assistant Editor, Papers of Abraham Lincoln Project

Naval Station New York: The Heart of the Union Anaconda
William Whyte, Doctoral Candidate, Lehigh University

Union Combined Operations in the Spring of 1862: An Examination of Leadership and Unity of Effort –
J. Michael Moore, Curator, Lee Hall Mansion

Pumping YOU Up: Conservation and Replication of the Worthington Steam Pumps from the USS Monitor
Will Hoffman, Conservator, The Mariners' Museum

Palmetto Iron: The Construction of the CSS Chicora and CSS Palmetto State, 1862
Charles Wexler, Doctoral Candidate, Auburn University

The Monitor and Beyond: Updates from the Graveyard of the Atlantic
David Alberg, Joe Hoyt, Monitor National Marine

Sunday, March 11 Sessions

USS Monitor: A Historic Ship Completes its Final Voyage
Dr. John Broadwater, NOAA's Monitor National Marine Sanctuary

Hunter Davidson and the CSS Squib
Professor Ed Wiser, Naval War College

USS Cumberland: Latest Findings
Gordon Calhoun, Historian and Editor, Hampton Roads Naval Museum

Civil War Naval History: A Panel Discussion
1. CSS Florida: the Vanishing Ship (Gordon Calhoun)
2. Calling the Union's "Bluff:" U.S. Navy Operations on the James River (Matt Eng)
Matthew Eng, Gordon Calhoun, Hampton Roads Naval Museum

The Monitor’s Unknown Mission: The Appomattox Raid, June 1862
Chuck Veit, President, Navy and Marine Living History Association

Union Sailors and Alcohol
Sarah Adler, Undergraduate, American University

Bad Luck All Around: The North Carolina Built Ironclads
Andrew Duppstadt, NC Division of State Historic Sites; Jim McKee, Historic Interpreter, Brunswick Town/Fort Anderson State Historic Site;
Chris Grimes, Interpreter, The Mariners' Museum

USS Monitor to Dreamland Bell: The Foundry of James Gregory-
David Grider, Architect, New York City

The USS Monitor at 150: Conservation Insights, Observations and Adventures
Conservation Staff, The Mariners' Museum

CSS Shenandoah: Her life, her impact
Sam Craghead, Museum of the Confederacy

Civil War Naval Chaplaincy and Rev. John L. Lenhart
Captain Thom Mitton, US Christian Commission

Civil War Public Memory in a Social Media World
Matthew Eng, Deputy Educator, Hampton Roads Naval Museum

Fighting for Their Lives: Theories on what happened when the Monitor went down
Paul Clancy, Virginian Pilot

For more information contact Anna Holloway at aholloway@marinersmuseum.org

In Case You Missed It: Black History Month Highlights

2012-02-14T11:38:00.000-05:00

In honor of African American history month, here are all previous post links to our "African American History Month Highlights" postings over the past year. We have also included the "Blacks in Blue Jackets" pamphlet as a .jpg so it is easy to download. Enjoy:

Siah Carter (Originally Posted February 10, 2012)

A Trend Worth Following (Originally Posted February 6, 2012)

Honor, Courage, Commitment (Originally Posted February 27, 2011)

Aaron Anderson (Originally Posted February 25, 2011)

John Lawson (Originally Posted February 24, 2011)

Robert Blake (Originally Posted February 16, 2011)

William Tillman (Originally Posted February 14, 2011)

Lawson and Robert Smalls (Originally Posted February 7, 2010)

Introductory Post on African American Sailors (Originally Posted February 4, 2010)

Blacks in Blue Jackets: Page 1

Blacks in Blue Jackets: Page 2

A Note on African American History Month
Celebrated actor Morgan Freeman said it best in an interview o 60 minutes. Freeman does not personally ascribe to terms like "Black History Month" or "African American History Month." Instead, Freeman declared that "Black history is American history." While there are those who agree and disagree on both sides, the sentiment is as true today as it was when it was originally created in the mid 1920s. No matter what, we are all distinctly American. The trials and tribulations of millions of citizens and soldiers both North and South 150 years ago tells us how far each side went to prove their beliefs and values. At the cost of over 620,000 men, that dream was realized by the United States of America and Abraham Lincoln, the intrepid President who turned the country's greatest struggle into a moral, ethical, and military victory. On the blood and toil of millions of soldiers and sailors around the world, the war ultimately brought about revolutionary change in the institution of slavery. As a statement, the Emancipation Proclamation shifted the war's overall focus. If there ever was doubt that the war began over the complicated nature of slavery, President Lincoln silenced any doubt with the Proclamation. It became the necessary stepping stone to the post-war Amendments granting slaves their freedom.

In what better anniversary lately can Americans come together and celebrate and commemorate the spirited role played by African Americans during the Civil War?

Professor and historian Stephen Ramold, author of Slaves, Sailors, and Contrabands, summed up the role of African American sailors nicely in a 2004 interview with The Journal of African American History: "They were Americans who didn't hesitate to fight for their country." Whatever color you may be, we are all Americans. Help to commemorate and honor those men and woman who fought to keep it that way. Keep the discussion going in whatever way you can. How do we celebrate? Why do we celebrate? I think the question speaks for itself.

Operations on the Savannah River - Early 1862

2012-02-10T18:24:00.007-05:00

Tattnall's fleet engaging USN gunboats on the Savannah River (source - Naval History and Heritage Command on-line photo archive):

After taking Port Royal, South Carolina, in November 1861, the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron began looking south down the Atlantic coast for the next target. USN leadership in Washington (Sec. Welles and Asst. Sec. Fox) wanted this to be the Port of Fernandina, Florida, but miscommunication and disagreement among US Army and Navy leaders in the region eventually focused on closing down the Port of Savannah, Georgia. While the US Army began to prepare for the siege and conquest of Fort Pulaski, near the mouth of the Savannah River, Flag Officer DuPont sent Cdr. John Rogers to reconnoiter the labyrinth of channels around and upstream of Ft. Pulaski to see what US Navy ships could do in the area. After several forays, Rogers concluded that shallow depths in the channels(exacerbated by obstacles placed by the Confederates) were a major constraint on naval operations in the area. During much of this effort, DuPont and US Army General Thomas W. Sherman argued over who was impeding operations in the region.

Eventually DuPont and Sherman agreed that a demonstration “in force” against the City of Savannah would buy some time while preparations were being made for the siege of Ft. Pulaski. In late January 1862, DuPont sent two squadrons, one under the command of Rogers and the other under Flag Capt. Charles H. Davis, up separate channels flanking the Savannah River (and eventually joining its mainstem). The Confederates interpreted this as an assault on Ft. Pulaski, and Commodore Josiah Tattnall, now commanding CSN Navy forces on the Georgia coast, assembled his Mosquito Fleet to resupply Ft. Pulaski. Tattnall’s flotilla steamed downriver from Savannah on 27 January, following the river mainstem. As they approached Pulaski, Tattnall found himself “in the gauntlet”; his ships were right in between Rogers’ and Davis’ squadrons in separate channels of the river delta, separated by marshy tidelands. Davis tried to get his ships through so he could directly engage Tattnall’s ships, but obstructions placed by the Confederates and shallow depths impeded him. Both Davis and Rogers thought that they could get behind Tattnall and block him from returning to Savannah when he made the run to Pulaski, but the crafty old Commodore in gray sent his smaller, shallow draft gunboats and transports on to aid the Fort and kept his flagship (CSS Savannah) and larger gunboats back in safer waters. When Rogers and Davis realized they were stymied, they both opened fire on Tattnall’s ships, which “returned the favor” in the best spirit. The firing continued for about an hour, and resumed in the afternoon after a break. Relatively little damage was caused to ships and crews on both sides.

By early February 1862, the siege of Ft. Pulaski was beginning to solidify as the US Army mounted batteries on adjacent islands and points. Much of the construction was done at night under the cover of darkness, and USN gunboats provided important cover and acted as a “force multiplier” (as Robert Browning aptly put it) during the day when tide and water depth permitted. Tattnall actually met with General Robert E. Lee in late February to discuss an effort to provide relief to the fort, but by then the Union force in the area would have pulverized the expedition they envisioned and they abandoned this idea. Pulaski eventually surrendered to Union forces in early April 1862.

Fort Pulaski after the Union siege. Source: US National Park Service web site

Black History Month Highlight: Siah Carter

2012-02-10T09:12:00.001-05:00

Siah Carter aboard USS Monitor

Like many other African American slaves, Siah Carter sought freedom adn refure in the Union Navy along the myriad waterways of the southern interior. At the time he joined the Union Navy, Carter was a slave at the Shirley Plantation in Charles City, Virginia. He became the first of eigtheen slaves to escape from Shirley Plantation in 1862, Twenty-two year old Carter fled down the James River two months after the Battle of Hampton Roads, finding USS Monitor laying at anchor. He enlisted aboard the ironclad as a "first class boy," serving as a coal heaver and cook's assistant for the duration of the ship's short existance. Carter survived the sinking of the famed vessels in December 1862, going on to serve on several other Union ships until the end of the war. He was discharged from the Union Navy in May 1865 and returned to Shirley Plantation to wed former slave Eliza Tarrow. They eventually settled in Bermuda Hundred, Virginia, and raised thirteen children.

Siah Carter's in children's popular literature

Protecting CSS Virginia -- At All Costs

2012-02-06T13:01:00.000-05:00

Harper's Weekly sketch of submarine attack on USS Minnesota in Hampton Roads in fall of 1861. (Library of Congress)

Acting Master William Cheeney was extremely anxious March 12, 1862, as he began writing a letter to Commander John Mercer Brooke in Richmond. The arrival of the Union Monitor had dramatically altered the naval situation in Hampton. The blockade remained in place and a feared buildup of Union forces around Fortress Monroe seemed imminent. But if the underwater explosives engineer could get the support of Brooke, the inventor of a revolutionary deep sea sounding device, a powerful Navy cannon, and one of the fathers of the ironclad CSS Virginia, Cheeney believed he had the means in hand to dispose of the wooden Union Navy's radically-designed defender.

Cheeney had already approached Commodore French Forrest, commander of Confederate naval forces in Hampton Roads, about securing a "little sheet iron cigar boat" about 12-feet long and 2 1/2- feet wide to do the job.

"When done, I shall make the first trial on the Monitor which is the only enemy our noble Virginia has to fear. I believe I shall succeed."

Asking for Brooke's patience if the project ran into a delay, Cheeney, who was born in New York and had served in the United States Navy, assured him that unlike the ironclads and Matthew Fontaine Maury's gunboats, "It will cost very little and will require about one week to complete it."

Why would Cheeney seem so assured that he could succeed and he would receive Brooke's support? He had done it before. Since the earliest days of the war, he had worked with submersibles and had built a "sub-marine boat" then in Richmond. But speed was necessary now. It "would take too long" to ready the submarine and send it to Norfolk for an attack on Monitor. He had won Brooke's support in the past to build the submarine, and he had every reason to believe he would have it now when the stakes were so high.

The Union Navy also had every reason to believe that such an attack by a submersible or a "sub-marine boat" was possible in Hampton Roads. In the fall of 1861, Cheeney had probably launched at least one attack against USS Minnesota, now aground following the Battle of the Ironclads. Shortly after that, the commander of USS Congress, now sunk, had positioned A-frame defenses around his ship to protect it from torpedoes (mines) or rip apart the floats of spar-tipped submerged Confederate attackers.

A female spy had tipped the Union Navy and Union Army off. Allan Pinkerton, head of the Secret Service, had taken "Mrs. E.H. Baker," one of his Chicago operatives with connections in Richmond, directly to Major General George B. McClellan and Navy Secretary Gideon Welles when she arrived in Washington in November 1861. There, she handed over her notes of a demonstration of the submarine's power that she had witnessed as the guest of a Confederate Army officer and a sketch of work being done on a much larger submarine at the Tredegar Iron Works that she made after touring the facility the next day.

Through field glasses, Mrs. Baker watched the "float," a green device atop the model submarine allowing air into the vessel, approach a scow. As the Army officer explained to her, two or three men operate the boat. They are "provided with submarine diving, armor, which enables them to work under the water and attach the magazine to the ship intended to be blown up."

For a few moments, the "float " stopped "within a few rods of the scow" before moving away. For a few more moments, nothing happened. She believed the experiment had failed.

"Without any previous warning, there was a terrific explosion, and the scow seemed lifted bodily out of the water and thrown into the air. Her destruction was complete."

The officer then told her that the plan nearing fruition was to have the larger submarine being fitted out at Tredegar taken to Norfolk and paired up with Patrick Henry and Yorktown, both converted steamers, in a coordinated attack on the water and below upon the Union fleet.

Pinkerton's memoirs can be troublesome when it comes to facts vs. hyperbole concerning himself and his agents and even dates.

On Oct. 12, more than a month before Mrs. Baker is said to have reported to Washington, the New York Herald published an account of a foiled attack on Minnesota, possibly using a submarine. Harper's Weekly reprinted the account with a sketch of the two vessels. Flag Officer Louis Goldsborough, commander of the Atlantic Blockading Squadron, reported to Welles several days earlier that "an attempt, no doubt, was made by the insurgents to get an infernal machine among our shipping" in Hampton Roads, but whether he was referring to a submarine or floating mines is unclear.

What is known is that Lieutenant Robert Minor failed in an attack on Congress off Newport News Point on the day Goldsborough wrote Welles, but he used floating mines.

Yet Pinkerton wrote, "One of the vessels of the blockading fleet ... had discovered the float, and putting out her drag-rope, had caught the air-tubes and thus effectually disabled the vessel from doing any harm, and no doubt drowning all who were on board." He didn't name the vessel saved the Federal fleet from destruction.

There also are no known surviving records of Cheeney's "sub-marine boat" engaged in combat in Hampton Roads either in 1861 or 1862. Torpedo boats, cigar boats, "Davids," CSS Hunley, and other similar vessels appear in a number of other accounts of later engagements at New Orleans, Mobile, and Charleston.

What Cheeney's letter clearly shows is the Confederate Navy's heightened interest in devising new technologies and techniques to frustrate the Union Navy's wealth and numbers. Often its grasp exceeded its reach.

But with Monitor on station and other ironclads on the way, the massive Army and Navy buildup for the Peninsula campaign was safely under way.

As matters turned out, there is no record of Cheeney's cigar boat attacking Monitor, either. In fact by the fall of 1862, he switched sides again -- rejoining the Union Navy where his work remains shrouded in secrecy.

Sources:

ORN, Ser. 1 Vol. 6, pp. 363, 392-393
"A Rebel Infernal Machine," Harper's Weekly, Nov. 2, 1861
Allan Pinkerton, The Spy of the Rebellion, G.W. Dillingham Co., New York, Google e-Book, pp. 396-403
John M. Coski, Capital Navy, Savas Woodbury Publishers, Campbell, Calif., 1996. pp. 116-121

African American Sailors and the Sesquicentennial: A Trend Worth Following

2012-02-06T09:54:00.000-05:00

The social history of the sailor will take priority in how we continue to interpret the navy’s role. Scholarship continues to detail how sailors dealt with the tedium of the blockade and the horrors of close-quartered combat on western rivers. Sailors who fought were a historically diverse group of individuals dating back to the Revolutionary War. When you begin to narrow down the focus of social history in the navies, one critical aspect merges each commemorative anniversary of the past to the current one: African American sailors. Problems of race and reconciliation during the semi-centennial and centennial are now rectified in a bevy of recent events, including the 2010 Signature Conference of the Virginia Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission at Norfolk State University. Their involvement during the war will likely take center stage throughout the next four years.

National recognized organizations like the National Park Service’s Civil War Soldiers and Sailors System (CWSS) are working to document and record the names of every Civil War sailor, black and white. Pushing this index forward is a historian’s steering committee comprising historians and researchers representing Howard University, the Naval History and Heritage Command, National Park Service, and other academic experts. According to the CWSS website, the online database, which features African Americans sailors as its primary focus, has approximately 8,000 names to search through. With over 18,000 African Americans serving in the Union Navy during the war, their work so far covers almost half of those accounted for.

Even if the Union Navy’s rank and file were not always progressive towards the abolition of slavery, one blogger commented that “the demands of war caused them to adapt to the vagaries of war and they were soon singing the praises of the African Americans serving on their vessels.”

The naval “melting pot” on both sides best represents how the majority of Americans want to remember the Civil War. The title of the 2010 Virginia Civil War Sesquicentennial was “Race, Slavery, and the Civil War: The Tough Stuff of American History and Memory.” Despite disagreements over the institution of slavery by both sides, all different races, colors, and creeds marched to the flag. For the Union Navy in particular, the role of the African American sailor is a way for Americans today to connect with their history and heritage. African Americans made the conscientious choice to fight for their freedom, regardless of conditions they faced. “African American sailors were needed,” historian Stephen Ramold remarked in the closing comments of a 2004 interview with The Journal of African American History. According to Ramold, “they were Americans who didn’t hesitate to fight for their country.” He goes on to say that the Union Navy “was remarkably modern [. . .] where everything was not a racial struggle.”

In the century before Executive Order #9981 ordered the full racial integration of American armed forces in 1948, sailors operating around the world during the war fought and died amongst their black brethren. Military equality paved its way on the shoulders of these sailors, although some are more notable than others within the public consciousness. The armed forces couldn’t ask for better PR today. Robert Smalls, the South Carolina slave pilot of the Planter who escaped with his family to the Union lines for freedom, became “the closest thing to a national black war hero from the Civil War.”

Long before the 54^th Massachusetts gloriously attacked Fort Wagner, African Americans forged the identity of today’s Navy through their service. Blacks in blue jackets represented the fighting spirit for the cause of freedom. This will undoubtedly arise and draw interest from the public in an ever-increasing time of uncertainty with military service in general. The story of black sailors serves as a constant reminder to Americans how far we have come.

Sources:

Jimmy Price, “James Mcpherson - Slavery, Freedom, and the Union Navy,” The Sable Arm, entry posted September 24, 2010, http://sablearm.blogspot.com/2010/09/james-mcpherson-slavery-freedom-and.html (accessed December 13, 2011).

Helen Hannon, “African Americans in the Navy during the Civil War,” The Journal of African American History 89, no. 4 (Autumn 2004), 361.

David Blight, Race and Reunion, 195.

Birth of the Brown Water Navy

2012-02-05T11:37:00.015-05:00

One-hundred and fifty years ago this week, an important component to the Federal efforts in the Western Theater came to the fore - the Mississippi River Squadron.

At the onset of war both the Army and Navy officers recognized the need for river gunboats complementing land operations along the Mississippi River and tributaries. The requirements for river operations - or "brown water" - differed significantly from the more traditional "blue water" navy's warship designs. On the Mississippi, the Navy needed light draft ships capable of maneuvering within the river channels. Likely tactical scenarios placed those gunboats in close proximity to enemy river defense batteries. So on that light draft, the boats had to carry structural bracing, armor, and heavy armament. Given these and other requirements, the ironclad river gunboats evolved almost independently of the contemporary "blue water" monitors.

Complying with immediate demands, the first river gunboats were conversions of existing river craft. Three riverboats became "timberclads" with the addition of heavy oak "armor" and a battery of naval guns. While useful for river patrols and action against less well defended points, these ships lacked the armor to deal with heavily fortified river bastions or the anticipated Confederate ironclads.

In September 1861 the Army acquired the ferry New Era for conversion into a timberclad. When turned over to the Navy for operations, Commander William D. "Dirty Bill" Porter renamed the ship USS Essex in honor of the famous War of 1812 era frigate commanded by his father. Porter also had light iron plating installed on the forward casemate and sides, making the Essex an "iron-plated" gunboat. She carried three 9-inch Dahlgren guns. While more formidable than the "timberclads," the Essex was not the all the Navy required. (Of note, the Navy completely rebuilt the Essex later in 1862 transforming the ship into a proper river ironclad.)

The solution came in the form of a class of armored gunboats, designed specifically for use on the rivers. Working from a description offered by the Army, naval chief constructor John Lenthall designed a vessel with very light draft. Lenthall then recommended the Army further consult with Samuel M. Pook, a shipbuilder of note, to refine the design. Pook would do more than just refine the design, . What emerged was a vessel uniquely adapted for riverine warfare.

Pook's design featured a hull 175 feet long and 50 feet wide, but drawing a draft of only 6 feet. A central casemate, not unlike later Confederate rams in appearance, housed a battery of heavy naval guns - three 8-inch, four 42-pdrs, and six 32-pdrs as designed. Five boilers, placed low in the hull, powered a central paddle wheel. Iron plate, some 2.5 inches thick, covered the forward casemate, sixty feet of the sides, and the pilot house. Because of the incomplete armor arrangements, these were not ironclads in the strict sense of the word. Although weighing 512 tons, Pook's gunboats could make nine miles-per-hour with a head of steam.

In August 1861, James Buchanan Eads won the contract to construct these vessels. Working at yards in Carondolet, Missouri and Mound City, Illinois, Eads' project move rapidly (mostly due to stiff penalties for late delivery!). First to roll off the ways was the USS St. Louis in mid-October at Carondelet. The USS Carondelet, USS Louisville, and USS Pittsburgh followed from the Missouri yards. The USS Cairo, USS Cincinnati, and USS Mound City came out of the yards in Illinois.

These seven "City-class" gunboats became the core of the Mississippi River Squadron. The St. Louis first went into action at Lucas Bend, just above Columbus, Kentucky, alongside the Essex, on January 11, 1862. Encountering three Confederate gunboats escorting a floating battery into position, the two Federal gunboats drove off their unarmored opponents. In the first engagement these "ironclad" gunboats established ascendency on the rivers.

During the first week of February, the Essex, St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Carondelet moved down the Tennessee River in support of a Federal force under General U.S. Grant. The Army didn't have much to do after the Navy's gunboats silenced Confederate defenses at Fort Henry. But assumptions about the gunboats effectiveness against shore defenses proved a bit premature. Later on February 14, at Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River four city-class gunboats could not pass the Confederate batteries. The problem was just as much tactical as technical.

Despite the Valentine's Day setback, the "brown water" gunboats figured prominently in Federal plans. The force continued to grow with the addition of more gunboats, such as the converted USS Benton at the end of February. In months to follow the gunboats pressed the Confederate defenses along the Mississippi. The Mississippi River Squadron provided the mobile striking force for the combined Army-Navy team that eventually drove the wedge through the Confederacy.

Salt Works Raids

2012-02-03T18:21:00.010-05:00

Destruction of a salt works by the US Bark Kingfisher on the Florida Coast. Source: Fla. Dept. of State on-line photo archive.

As the Civil War progressed, salt became one of the most vital commodities for the Confederacy. Salt was the primary means of preserving meat at that time, along with many other critical uses. By the end of 1861, the CSA recognized that it required a reliable supply of salt, as the tightening US Navy blockade was beginning to severely cut off imports from Europe. Every year, the states making up the Confederacy required 6 million bushels of salt, over half of which was imported. Before the war, salt sold for 50 cents a bushel (sack) off the ships at New Orleans; it sold for $25 per bushel in Savannah in January 1862. By October of that year, it was selling for $140 per bushel in Atlanta. Production of salt became so important that if you worked in a salt works, it meant an exemption from conscription into the Confederate Army.

While some salt was produced along the coasts of many of the southern states, its remote coastline made Florida the ideal place for this enterprise. Salt production was particularly prolific along Florida’s Gulf coast, and a large number of Confederate salt works were established, where sources of saltwater and wood (for stoking fires) were abundant. It eventually became a major task of the Union Navy blockaders to locate and destroy these works, much of this responsibility falling to the East Gulf Blockading Squadron, responsible for most of the Florida Gulf coast. As runner after runner was captured and its cargo examined, the USN blockaders almost always found salt in the cargoes. This led the Squadron command to realize that crippling the supply of salt, both brought in by runners and produced locally, would be a major strategic blow to the Confederacy.

The "Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies" contains a wealth of reports on raids on Gulf Coast salt works during the war. I will be posting updates on significant raids on the appropriate CWN 150 dates as we hit those in the coming years. Stay tuned !!

A good overall summary of the Union raids on salt works is by my USS Ft. Henry shipmate Marine Sgt. Dave Ekardt on the Naval and Marine Living History web site at: http://www.navyandmarine.org/ondeck/1862saltraids.htm

CSS Nashville in England

2012-02-02T10:29:00.002-05:00

The second Confederate commerce raider to put to sea was the steamer CSS Nashville. It was a problematic cruise and not nearly as successful as Sumter's. Under the command of Lieutenant Robert Pegram, Nashville made a dash out of Charleston to Bermuda in October 1861. She had to remain in Bermuda until November to repair damages after striking a reef in Charleston Harbor. After leaving Bermuda, the ship headed east towards England. She found the clipper ship Harvey Birch and burned her. It was the only capture of the eastward journey. High seas severely damaged the upper deck, washing away the wheelhouse a portion of the hurricane deck. She arrived in Southampton, England, battered and bruised, on November 21.

The stay in Southampton was not a happy one. British authorities refused any assistance beyond fixing Nashville enough to get her back to sea. Unknown arsonists then attempted to torch the ship while she was in dry dock. Finally, the steam sloop USS Tuscarora arrived in Southampton with the express intent of engaging and capturing Nashville (image at right is Nashville at Southampton with Tuscarora in the background).

USS Tuscarora as depicted in the London Illustrated News

Fortunately for for Pegram, the British did not play favorites. They informed Tuscarora's commanding officer, Commander Tunis Augustus Macdonough Craven, that he would have to wait a full twenty-four hours after Nashville left before his ship could leave. With the steam frigate HMS Shannon standing a close watch next to Tuscarora, Pegram put to sea on February 3. Nashville steamed west towards Bermuda.

CWN 150 Talk in Darien, GA

2012-01-31T00:14:00.000-05:00

Ashantilly Center in Darien, GA

Last week, I had the distinct pleasure to give a talk at the Ashantilly Center in Darien, GA. Over 50 residents of Darien and nearby St. Simon's Island were in attendance. The place was very quaint and charming, with a wonderful space to give a lecture in the library. The lecture was part of a series honoring and commemorating John M. Kell, the Executive Officer of the infamous CSS Alabama. Although I did not particularly touch on Kell or Semmes specifically, a local collector was nice enough to bring several first edition books on the Alabama, Semmes, and Kell to the Center. For that, I am grateful. It was truly a unique experience and an honor to speak to the fine people of Darien.

The focus of the talk was the ongoing role of the Civil War navies in the sesquicentennial of the American Civil War. Specifically, the role of the Civil War Navy in public memory was mentioned as a critical factor in the ongoing dialog of the Civil War. Now 150 years later, it is more important than ever to commemorate all aspects of the war, both on land and at sea. In the presentation, I discuss three major themes or "trends" that will emerge (or continue to surface) during the remaining years of the sesquicentennial. These three trends are: 1. All Things "Battle of Hampton Roads" 2. African American Involvement and 3. Social Media Utilization. I can only We can see that clearly with the increased focus now on the USS Monitor. Do you agree with these trends? Let me know here, or on our other social media outlets (Facebook, on Twitter @CivilWarNavy).

A special thanks to Cary Knapp and all the folks at the Ashantilly Center/Coastal Georgia University. This trip was made possible by a generous grant from the Georgia Council of the Humanities. I certainly look forward to working more with Cary in the near future!


First Edition Books on Semmes, Kell, and the Alabama

Speaking of the Monitor, don't forget the FREE LEGO shipbuilding program this Saturday at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum, which features a model version of the USS Monitor!

Full Speed Ahead,

Matthew T. Eng

CSS Sumter Crosses the Atlantic

2012-01-23T11:12:00.004-05:00

Once Raphael Semmes and CSS Sumter escaped from the West Indies, they headed east across the Atlantic. Along the way, he captured a few more ships, namely a whaler out of New Bedford and a schooner out of New York carrying food. By the time Sumter arrived in Cadiz, Spain, in January 1862, she had captured sixteen ships. However, none of the ships were particularly big catches. Semmes would later complain to his superiors that despite capturing all these ships, he only took in about $1,000 in cash. Thus, he needed more money to refit his ship and his men.

As for the U.S. Navy, Welles had six cruisers looking for Sumter (in some cases as far south as Brazil): USS Niagara, San Jacinito, Richmond, Keystone State, Powhatan, and Iroquois. When Semmes read Welles' public account of the search for his cruiser, the Confederate captain wrote a letter from Cadiz to the London Times mocking the U.S. Navy Secretary.

Semmes, however, had a more serious problem than U.S. Navy cruisers. Sumter was falling apart. Spanish authorities only allowed him temporary repairs and no fuel. Semmes departed Cadiz and headed to the British colony of Gibraltar, hoping to find a more sympathetic ear. He did not. For the next several weeks, he attempted to procure coal and supplies, but did not succeed. With some of the enlisted sailors deserting, Semmes pondered what to do next.

The Confederacy's First Ironclad and Her Attack on a Wooden Ship

2012-01-19T11:31:00.003-05:00

As head of the U.S. diplomatic mission to the free city of Hamburg, James Anderson was quite far away from Civil War. During his daily business in September 1861, the war came to him. One day, he encountered a German citizen who had just left New Orleans. This citizen, who had Union sympathies, provided Anderson with a sketch and description of a "turtle"-like ironclad (shown above) with a "hellish engine" under construction. The ironclad's builders, according to the information, wanted to ram the steam sloop USS Brooklyn. Anderson quickly passed the intelligence to Secretary of State William Seward.

The man behind this turtle from Hell, was New Orleans river pilot John A. Stepheson. Having failed to get any support from the Confederate government for his idea, Stepheson raised money on his own and converted an ice breaking tugboat into an ironclad ram. He wanted to construct "such a vessel that would be able to drive off or sink the most powerful man-of-war without the use of cannon or other instrument of warfare."

Once constructed, the Confederate government came to its senses and bought Stepheson's warship. It named her CSS Manassas. In October 1861, Confederate Naval officers took Manassas and several other small ships down the Mississippi River and attack the Union squadron of three ships at the Head of Passes. What is the first ironclad attack against a wooden warship, Manassas went after the steam sloop USS Richmond under the command of Commander John Pope (not to be confused with the Union Army general John Pope). Neither side distinguished themselves in the battle as Manassas' ram attack only achieved a glancing blow, some of the rockets fired by the Confederate squadron meant to set off a series of fire rafts landed on their own ships, the Union squadron' cannon fire was erradtic, and both sides ships ran aground attempting to engage.

The Confederate squadron withdrew back to New Orelans, but not after putting enough fear into Pope to order a retreat. "Put this matter in any light you may, it is the most ridiculous affair that ever took place in the American Navy," Gideon Welles wrote to David Dixon Porter after the war. Pope later asked for medical leave. Welles made the request permanent and forced Pope out of the service. Manassas, in the mean time, was made ready to defend New Orelans.

Naval Actions at Seahorse Key, Florida 1862

2012-01-16T08:07:00.010-05:00

The Cedar Keys, on the Gulf Coast of Florida (consisting of Way, Depot, Atsena Otie, Seahorse, Snake, and North Keys), was an important port at the start of the Civil War, in part because a newly constructed rail line connected the port to interior parts of the state and ran all the way up to Fernandina on the Atlantic coast. Seahorse Key had a light station (constructed in 1854 under the direction of then Lt. George Gordon Meade) which guided ships into the Port of Cedar Key and the nearby mouth of the Suwannee River. The Town of Cedar Key itself was located on Atsena Otie Key.

On 16 January 1862 the Union gunboat USS Hatteras hove to off Cedar Key and debarked ships boats which entered the harbor and burned four schooners, three sloops, a scow, a sailboat, and a launch. Some of the schooners were loaded with cotton, turpentine, rosin, and lumber, ready to run the blockade. The railroad depot and wharf, seven railroad cars, the telegraph station and a storehouse were also burned, and arms and equipment confiscated. To add to all this, the ship’s crew captured most of a small Confederate garrison manning a gun battery on Seahorse Key, including the officer and 13 soldiers. Needless to say, the bluejackets of the Hatteras earned their pay that day.

Not long after Hatteras departed, the USS Tahoma arrived off Seahorse Key on 1 February 1862 and commenced shelling the battery, just in case it had been reoccupied. Ships boats were sent ashore and the battery was found abandoned, with the destruction wrought by the crew of Hatteras still evident. For the remainder of the war, Seahorse Key with its lighthouse (which had been disabled by the Confederates) remained under Union control, and was used as a secondary base of operations by the East Gulf Blockading Squadron, thus depriving the Confederacy of the use of Cedar Key as a port for the remainder of the War. Thanks to the Florida Dept. of State and NHHC on-line photo archives for the illustrations.

USS Tahoma:

Key West and the East Gulf Blockading Squadron

2012-01-13T18:41:00.018-05:00

Sketch of Key West in Civil War period

In a prior post ("The Blockade Begins"), I covered the formation of the Union Navy blockading squadrons. The blockade of the Gulf coast of the southern states was initially the responsibility of the Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron, under the command of Flag Officer William Mervine. In February 1862, the Gulf Squadron was divided into the West Gulf Blockading Squadron, under the command of Flag Officer David G. Farragut, and the East Gulf Blockading Squadron under the command of Flag Officer William McKean, who succeeded Mervine, possibly in part because Navy Sec. Gideon Welles thought the former Gulf Squadron commander not aggressive enough. The East Gulf Squadron initially had the sector of coast from Cape Florida (just north of the Florida Keys) around to St. Andrews Bay, east of Pensacola, FL. Protestations from the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron that their sector was too extensive resulted in the extension of the East Gulf Squadron’s sector of operations north up the Florida East Coast to Mosquito Inlet (present day Ponce De Leon Inlet), north of Cape Canaveral.

The East Gulf Blockading Squadron was based out of Key West, Florida, which always remained in Union hands; it never had to be re-taken by Union forces. Back in those days, the only way to get to Key West was by sea. The overseas railroad across the Florida Keys, built by Mr. Flagler, and the later overseas highway that was the old “US 1” were decades away. Key West had a US Navy base and was guarded by Ft. Taylor on the mainland and Ft. Jefferson, offshore on the Dry Tortugas. The East Gulf Squadron had low priority for the US Navy throughout the War, mainly because there were no major ports such as Wilmington, Charleston, Mobile or New Orleans, and thus little potential for major action. It was “the backwater” for USN personnel assigned to ships in the squadron. Yellow fever and malaria were constant plagues on the men who served there. Cdr. Percival Drayton, on his way from the South Atlantic Squadron over to the West Gulf Squadron to serve as Farragut’s Flag Captain, commented on his time in Key West (to a friend in the northern US):

“This is rather a dreary residence I should suppose, a sand bank varied with cocoa nut and a few other trees of the tropics, but the soil so light and sandy, as to be almost unfit for gardening purposes, and for all such products as the ordinary table vegetables your city affords their only supply, . . .”

Despite the unspectacular nature of the duty, I have to think that the efforts of the sailors of the East Gulf Blockading Squadron contributed to the success of the blockade, as much as those of any other of the squadrons. Dr. George Buker chronicled the efforts of the East Gulf Squadron in his book “Blockaders, Refugees, & Contrabands. Civil War on Florida’s Gulf Coast, 1861-1865” and Robert Macomber created a compelling story of the activities of the fictional naval officer Peter Wake of the East Gulf Squadron in three novels: “At the Edge of Honor”, “Point of Honor” and “Honorable Mention.” I highly recommend all to you.

Many thanks to Sarah, fellow CWN 150 Guest Blogger, for making available a link to Percival Drayton’s letters (I have found them fascinating) and the Florida Dept. of State on-line photo archive for the old photos and illustrations of Key West.

Fort Taylor, Key West, FL:

Navy anchorage at Key West, FL:

Navy barracks at Key West after the War:

Preparing for Battle in Northeast North Carolina

2012-01-13T11:01:00.005-05:00

The combined fleet of the "Burnside Expedition," as it left Hampton Roads for Cape Hatteras

With Cape Hatteras secured Union ground forces in mid 1861, both sides recognized that one of the next targets would be the Albemarle Sound. Confederate forces were under the command Norfolk-native Commodore William F. Lynch (most famous for leading a U.S. Navy expedition to the Holy Land in 1840s to prove the existence of the Biblical cities of Sodom and Gomorrah) and the 33rd Governor of Virginia, Brigadier General Henry A. Wise. The two men did not get along very well, with Confederate Army officers not taking the threat of a Union attack seriously and not shipping more heavy guns to Roanoke Island. Most of the 179 guns guarding Norfolk and Portsmouth were geared towards an attack from Hampton Roads, not from the south.

On the Union side, Brigadier General Ambrose Burnside had begun assembling a combined task force in Annapolis and Hampton Roads. With the blessing of General George McClellan, Burnside assembled a 12,000-man division made up of men mostly from coastal towns. He then integrated with the division, a squadron of lightly armed steam gunboats. The U.S. Navy under the control Flag-officer Louis Goldsborough and Dublin, Ireland-native Commander Stephen Rowan assembled their own force of more heavily armed, light draft gunboats. By the beginning of 1862, sixty gunboats and transports had assembled in Hampton Roads.

Like the Port Royal expedition, Confederate intelligence saw the task force forming in Hampton Roads. Unlike the Port Royal expedition, they had know idea where it was going. Speculation ran from targets in North Carolina, South Carolina, or even an assault down the Elizabeth River and Norfolk. This was due to better secrecy on the Union side as individual ship commanders did not receive their orders until the day they left Hampton Roads. In early January 1862, the fleet deployed. Their target: Roanoke Island.

CWN 150 Booth Pictures at the 2012 SNA Conference

2012-01-11T17:07:00.000-05:00

CWN 150 Exhibit and Booth at the 2012 SNA Conference

Naval History and Heritage Command Booth

Upcoming Events for the CWN 150

2012-01-09T16:26:00.001-05:00

Wow. A new year for all of us. For the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War, it is the follow up to the most cataclysmic series of events which led to the outbreak of hostilities between the United States and Confederacy.

2011 (1861) was an excellent start to the events and activities surrounding the role of the Navy's during the war. 2012 promises to be an important year, if not the most important one, for the CWN 150. There are tons of events planned and scheduled for this commemorative year, so stay tuned. In the near future, however, there are two that are directly on the radar for January (not to mention the CWN 150 Watercolor Contest and LEGO shipbuilding program!).

2012 SNA Conference in Crystal City, VA
The CWN 150 will have a booth in the exhibitors room at the 2012 Surface Navy Association at the Hyatt Regency in Crystal City. The conference will be held from Tuesday, January 10th to Thurs, January 12th. Come stop by and get a FREE copy of the CWN 150 Special Edition Daybook or have a chat with me about anything related to the exciting Civil War Navy commemoration this upcoming year. I will also have some prize drawings to win a copy of the Civil War at Sea DVD which just came out in coordination with Bob Rositzke and Bill Erickson of the Surface Navy Association.

It will also be the debut of the new CWN 150 traveling exhibit panel which highlights the history and heritage of the Civil War navies, noting how the war itself was the beginning of the creation of a modern surface navy. Come check it out.

See the full list of exhibitors, events, and speakers for the SNA Conference HERE.

Lecture at Ashantilly Center in Darien, GA (January 22, 3:00 pm)
I will also be speaking next Saturday at the Ashantilly Center in GA. The fine folks at Coastal Georgia University helped to put together this event, which also includes lectures from several of our friends at the National Civil War Naval Museum im Columbus. According to the Ashantilly Center's website, the description is as follows:

"Matt Eng, Deputy Educator at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum and an expert on American Naval History, will discuss the importance of commemorating the Civil War’s Sesquicentennial, focusing much of his presentation on the Navy during that period."

Flattering as the description is, I will be discussing the overall scope of the CWN 150 and its role in the ongoing narrative of memory during the war. For more information on the event, please go to the full link/details HERE or the Mcintosh County Homepage HERE.

I look forward to an excellent year for the CWN 150 and the Civil War Sesquicentennial. Let's make it the best one yet! Stay tuned for more info on the March 2012 Battle of Hampton Roads events at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum and the Mariners' Museum.

Full Speed Ahead,

Matthew T. Eng

The Confederate Navy's Favorite Shipyard -- Birthplace of CSS Alabama, 'Birkenhead Rams.'

2012-01-09T15:10:00.002-05:00

(U.S. Navy Library)

'Birkenhead Ram:' Called El Tousson because it was supposedly being bought by Egypt, the ship was seized at the Laird shipyard across the River Mersey from Liverpool in 1863.

James D. Bulloch was the most important Confederate naval agent working in Europe. His experiences as an American naval officer and in the merchant marine proved invaluable in buying blockade runners that kept war materiel flowing into the South, designing commerce raiders, like CSS Alabama, that caused Union shipowners to switch flags with a neutral country to protect their cargoes and ocean-going ironclads like the "Birkenhead Rams" powerful enough to attack Union blockaders and speedy enough to terrorize Northern ports.

Working out of a small office in the impressive mansion of Fraser, Trenholm & Co., the Confederacy's fiscal arm in Great Britain, Bulloch soon made the acquaintance of the Laird Brothers across the River Mersey from Liverpool. The company already was known as a first-rate shipbuilder and a technological pioneer, one that Charles Prioleau, a transplanted South Carolinian and in charge of Fraser, Trenholm in Liverpool had already done business with. He bought blockade-runner Herald and possibly a few others early in the war to operate out of the company's home port of Charleston, S.C.

The firm's name reflected its history. Its offices were spacious and stately. Fraser had long since left the Liverpool enterprise, and George Trenholm, a future Confederate Treasury secretary, was one of the wealthiest men in the South.

In late 1861, Bulloch presented the Lairds with a design for a wooden screw steamer capable of cruising at 13 knots. On paper, the 210-foot vessel could be a special merchantman or it could be what it really was destined to be the Conferacy's second commerce raider. He expected to delivery in the spring of 1862.

Bulloch consistently denied that John Laird, who left the active business for a seat in Parliament in 1860, or any of his sons knew that "No. 290," the 290th ship on their order books, was a warship, violating Great Britain's Neutrality Proclamation concerning the war in North America and its Foreign Enlistment Act. The denial seems a stretch, particularly in light of other business the yard conducted with the Confederacy, all through subterfuges.

Who were these Lairds and their shipbuilding company courted and cursed by the United States for building CSS Alabama and the rams and cmbraced by the Confederacy?

The Napoleonic wars catapulted the Lairds into a leading position among Scotland's maritime businesses. They soon cast about for ways to expand the family business of ropeworks and niche elements of shipbuilding. When the first William Laird arrived in Liverpool, the thirty-year-old was like a number of young Scots trying their business hand across the gamut of maritime commerce still open in Great Britain's busiest Atlantic port. The Channel ports were threatened from the start by invasion.

When the wars finally ended in 1815, William moved the family business into new ventures. By 1822, he was a stockholder in the St. George Packet Co., offering steamer service between Liverpool and Glasgow. Soon enough, the company expanded its service to Dublin and other ports on the Irish and North Seas.

But the most important step William Laird took occurred in 1824 when he, John Hamilton and John Forsyth -- "all clever men" -- bought a sandy strip of riverfront property in a fishing village of fifty souls across from Liverpool for a rew hundred pounds. Laird's plans for Birkenhead were grand -- an ironworks first and then a shipyard "less tied by the trammels of old thinking."

Early on, the Lairds were committed to large vessels, using iron, propelled by steam and screw propellers. New ideas flowed into their yard like the twice daily tides. For instance, William Laird worked with John Ericsson on a steam wheel and rotary steam engine; and one of its first vessels was the Robert F. Stockton, built on the order of the rich American naval officer of the same name. Stockton was the principal force behind the American Navy's screw propeller Princeton.

By the late 1830s, Laird and Sons, the company's name changed several times before the Civil War, was building ships for East India Company, transatlantic steamers, gunboats for duty on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, small vessels and warships for the Royal Navy, and a paddle-wheeler for the Mexican Navy.

When the Crimean War began in the mid-1850s, the grandsons were monitoring French shipbuilding techniques in Toulon and the British fleet's performance on the Black Sea. The company with its 2,000 workers was ready for the Admiralty's buy orders for a fleet of ironclads in its "new yard" immediately after the fighting ceased.

Business again was booming.

When John Laird left for Parliament, he proudly announced Laird and Sons was in capable hands with a worldwide reputation of quality and innovation.

The yard's work with the Confederacy started small with Prioleau's order for a blockade runner, paid for out of Fraser, Trenholm's funds; but as the war dragged on, Bulloch with the Confederate Navy's orders plus credit from Fraser, Trenholm promised more work -- all done through false fronts and masked buyers.

While Charles Francis Adams, the Union minister to Great Britain, and Thomas Haines Dudley, the Union consul in Liverpool filed objection upon objection with British customs officials, the Royal Navy, and Foreign Minister John Russell about Laird's work with the Confederacy, Gustavus Fox, the Union's assistant secretary of the Navy, looked for ways to do business with the yard -- using his own false end-buyers.

Likely the thinking among the Lairds was: Someone had to profit from a civil war. Why shouldn't it be one of the world's premier shipyards, theirs?

First Battle of Fort Fisher

2011-12-24T15:44:00.007-05:00

147 years ago on this day, Union Admiral David Dixon Porter and Major General Benjamin Butler teamed up against Confederate Major General Robert Hoke in the First Battle of Fort Fisher in New Hanover County, North Carolina, which protected the port of Wilmington. The battle was a Confederate victory, though the fort was taken in the Second Battle of Fort Fisher in January 1865.

From the 7 January 1865 issue of Harper's Weekly:
From Richmond papers we learn that Porter's fleet, estimated by the rebels at fifty vessels, including two Monitors, made a "furious" attack on Fort Fisher about 1 P.M., December 24, and was continued through the day, and repeated the next day at 10 o'clock A.M. The enemy admits a loss of twenty-three wounded the first day. Under cover of a heavy fire Butler had succeeded in landing above the fort with his military division, consisting of portion, of the Twenty-fourth and Twenty-fifth Corps. General Butler's command still held its ground, although it had been repulsed in an assault on the fort. From a report which comes from Newborn, dated the 24th, it appears that during the night of the 23d a terrible explosion occurred. This was doubtless the explosion of the Louisiana, which had been laden with 300 tons of gunpowder, and exploded in front of Fort Fisher previous to the near approach of the fleet. The rebel reports, however, make no mention of this fact, though they admit that the situation of the fort is precarious. Fort Fisher is situated on Federal Point, on the north bank, and at the mouth of Cape Fear River, twenty miles below Wilmington. It commands the approach to Wilmington by New Inlet, and its capture will insure a complete blockade of that most important port.

First Naval Engagement at Mobile Bay

2011-12-24T07:01:00.008-05:00

Mobile Bay and the City of Mobile, Alabama, are seldom written or talked about in Civil War Naval History except in connection with the famous Battle of Mobile Bay in August 1864. I’ll be putting together a few posts on Mobile Bay, the city, and naval events transpiring there during the course of the war and leading up to the historic 1864 engagement.

On the first Christmas Eve of the war, 24 December 1861, the first naval battle at Mobile Bay was fought between the Confederate gunboat CSS Florida and the US Navy blockader USS Huntsville. The Confederate ship in this case was not the famed commerce raider, it was a civilian steamer seized by the state government and turned over to the CS Navy for conversion into a gunboat. The Florida ventured out from its anchorage near Fort Morgan and fired on the Huntsville that morning. The two ships dueled at long range for a bit less than an hour and inflicted little or no damage to one another, but the engagement did attract a considerable crowd of onlookers from Confederate Forts Morgan and Gaines and the adjacent USN blockading vessels.

The Mobile press reported elatedly (but incorrectly) that the Confederate gunboat scored a resounding victory against the Union blockader. Commander Cicero Price of the Huntsville noted in his after-action report to the Gulf Squadron Command that his smoothbore guns were entirely inadequate for the task and recommended his ship be refitted with better, rifled armament. The Florida was later renamed the CSS Selma (as shown on the illustration) and was a participant in the Battle of Mobile Bay.

Thanks to the Naval History and Heritage Command web site for the two illustrations of the naval ships involved, along with all the other resources they provide, and best wishes for the holidays and thanks to all the followers of this CWN 150 Blog.

Dinner Party Talk that Changed the Civil War

2011-12-23T15:08:00.001-05:00

In this rendering, President Abraham Lincoln has finished reading the Emancipation Proclamation to his cabinet. Sitting immediately to Lincoln's right is Navy Secretary Gideon Welles, with the president's message in front of him. The papers on the table in the far right are the Coast Survey's slave population maps that initally guided the work the Blockade Strategy Board. (Image from NOAA archives)

Far from his family in Cambridge, Mass., Commander Charles Davis was finishing his usual Tuesday night dinner with Alexander Dallas Bache at his Capitol Hill residence. It was a troubled time in Washington. In late May 1861, the capital was nearly surrounded by traitors. To the south, Virginia was to vote on secession that week. The outcome, except in the western counties, was expected to be overwhelmingly in favor of leaving the Old Union. To the north and east, Maryland was in riot.

There was little comfort in seeing Union volunteers from Massachusetts and New York using the unfinished Capitol as a large barracks and armory. For both men, there was even less comfort in knowing the water approaches -- up the Chesapeake Bay and on the Potomac River -- were well within the range of the large naval guns seized by rebellious shipyard workers in Portsmouth.

With that as backdrop, it was to be one of the most important "private" dinners in the Civil War because it set in a motion a flexible but well thought-out plan that eventually crushed the rebellion.

In the pre-war years when Bache, the superintendent of the Coast Survey, entertained in the survey's drawing rooms, his parties were known for "the quip and the jest." They were remembered as "noctes ambiranae," recalling his days touring Germany with Joseph Henry, now heading the Smithsonian Institution. Davis, a rarity among naval officers then, was educated at Harvard, more an an academic that seagoing war-fighter and extremely comfortable with Bache, the great grandson of Benjamin Franklin.

The West Point-educated Bache, instead of continuing the banter he was known for, outlined his ideas to the head of the Nautical Almanac on how the Union Navy could enforce the president's recently proclaimed blockade. As matters stood that spring along the 3,500-mile Southern coast, the Confederates were correct in arguing that it was a "paper blockade," not at all interfering with shipping coming in or going out.

Behind closed doors in the survey's spartan offices even before the war broke out, Bache had his cartographers working on two maps -- one of the slaveholding states from Delaware to Texas and the other of virginia -- using 1860 census data to indicate by shading the percentage of slaves in each county. Bache saw these maps as critical political and military tools, as important to the war effort as the survey's charts of Southern ports and waterways.

In raw form, Bache's ideas complemented those of Lieutenant General Winfield Scott's plan to strange the rebellion from the Atlantic on the east and the Gulf of Mexico in the south and drive westward and southward across land using the inland rivers. The superintendent, on paper subordinate to the Treasury secretary, then was at the height of his political (coming from a long line of public officials on his mother's side and through marriage) and bureaucratic powers (especially through his close alliance with Henry) as he laid out his plan to "establish a military commission ... to determine military proceedings and operations along the coast." The good bureaucrat that he was, Bache had already talked with Gustavus Fox, the Navy's ambitious and senior clerk, about systematizing the war effort.

Another month passed before the Blockade Strategy Board actually met at the Navy Department's request. The first meeting and all that followed were held secretly inside the Smithsonian's castle on the mall, a location conveniently between the War and Navy Departments by the White House and the Coast Survey on Capitol Hill. Bache was there, as was Davis, now the board's secretary. Samuel F. DuPont, another close friend of Bache and Davis, also was named to the "secret, important and complex service." The "military member" was Major John Barnard, an expert in coastal fortifications and a former superintendent of the Military Academy.

Nothing moved fast in Washington until the Union Army's calamity outside of Manassas Junction July 21. By then, the board had only completed work on the Atlantic Coast. Nonetheless Navy Secretary Gideon Welles and Fox called them to the Navy Department to hear the details. The two senior Navy civilians passed the information onto Lincoln, the rest of the cabinet, and to Scott.

As the summer heated up, the board's straegy was accepted as the best way forward -- even its call for joint operations, a goal rarely met during the Civil War. It also appeared to be the fastest way to win the war.

Welles in his annual report to Congress couldn't say enough good things about the strategy and how it worked at Port Royal and the Outer Banks. It was a lonesome cheery note coming from a cabinet secretary that December. Even if he knew, he didn't mention the private dinner party talk between two old friends where it was first rolled out in detail.

As for the blockade strategy ensuring quick victory, that turned out to be wishful yearend thinking.

BOHR Watercolor Contest at HRNM

2011-12-21T12:14:00.001-05:00

American poet Amy Lowell once wrote: "Art is the desire of a man to express himself, to record the reactions of his personality to the world he lives in."

As part of the sesquicentennial of arguably the most famous of all Civil War naval battles, the Hampton Roads Naval Museum/CWN 150 will hold a Battle of Hampton Roads Watercolor Art Contest in honor of the famed event.

We are inviting all those in the Hampton Roads area to heed the words of Ms. Lowell and create original pieces of art. Watercolor art may be developed anytime between now and March 8. March 8 is the deadline for drop off. Be creative! For those of you fans of the CWN 150 who are not in the area, you are more than welcome to take pictures of your own creations (any type of art form) and post them to the CWN 150 Facebook page. We will repost your art on this blog.

The contest, however, only applies to watercolor.. Winners of the art contest will receive a prize package courtesy of the Hampton Roads Naval Museum. All submitted watercolor art will be unveiled at HRNM during the FREE After Hours History program on March 8, 2012, at 6pm. More details to follow on the event. For Civil War Navy buffs, this is a perfect kick off to the Battle of Hampton Roads Weekend!
Take a look at the full details, rules, and the registration form for the watercolor contest on the Hampton Roads Naval Museum Blog. If you have any other questions, please contact Laura Orr, Special Events HRNM, at laura.l.orr@navy.mil.

CSS Sumter Escapes-Again

2011-12-15T14:33:00.003-05:00

Commander James Palmer, commanding officer of the steam sloop USS Iroquois, received word in mid-November 1861 that the Confederate cruiser CSS Sumter had made anchor on the French island of Martinique. The Confederate raider and her captain Raphel Semmes had already taken eight prizes since the ship's dramatic breakout from the Head of Passes earlier in the war.

For eight days, Palmer and his company watched Sumter as French authorities showed Semmes and his company all the hospitality they could offer. Palmer informed Secretary Welles that there was a good chance that Sumter would make a break for it during a moonless night. He was right. On November 25, Sumter made her break with an experienced pilot on board.

Per international rules governing warring parities in a neutral port, Palmer had to wait a full 24-hours before taking up a pursuit. Palmer was well aware of the escape as he had spies on shore. Colonial authorities objected to use of such spies. Palmer, however, commented that the French would just "have to pocket" such objections as he believed he had followed every single protocol.

Sumter made a successful escape and proceeded to the east to the open waters of the Atlantic. Palmer received intelligence that Semmes had bought several dozen articles of cold weather gear. This lead Palmer to believe that Sumter was heading for Europe, specifically Gibraltar, and not another tropical port (as some thought). He was right again.

Several people, including officers on board Iroquois, accused Palmer of disloyalty and/or incompetence for letting Sumter escape. Palmer simply responded "[if] I had committed an error of judgement, which I may have, I may be at once relieved of command." He was not relieved and Palmer retired a commodore at the end of his career.

The Blockade comes to Florida

2011-12-10T12:10:00.007-05:00

I think historians of the Civil War Navies have established that blockade duty was boring, drudgery, tedious, taxing, (fill in your favorite adjective here ___________), and demanding on the ships and sailors who implemented it.

It was also a vital part of the Union war effort. In an earlier post I commented on one of the numerous and myriad “small victories” that the blockade accomplished (12 Oct 2011) by the destruction of the blockade runner Watson off Charleston, SC. Here’s another one.

In the early part of December 1861, Flag Officer DuPont of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron ordered Commander Charles Steedman of the sidewheel steam gunboat USS Bienville to take up station off St. Simon’s Sound, Georgia. As part of this patrol, Steedman also cruised south to the mouth of the St. Johns River, Florida. On 11 December, the Bienville sighted two blockade runners under sail off the mouth of the river. Her crew captured the pilot schooner Sarah and Caroline, and the other runner was driven ashore. The captured runner carried 60 barrels of turpentine and was evidently bound for Nassau, Bahamas.

The blockade was now officially imposed off the coast of Florida.

Full Speed....er...Ahead?

2011-12-02T12:46:00.000-05:00

Photo by Margot Kline

A few months ago, we posted a short series of stories about a marker denoting the Knoxville area birthplace of historic first Admiral David Glasgow Farragut was missing. The 111-year old marker sat idle on the property of Farragut's supposed birthplace at Lowe's Ferry until this summer when it was reported that the marker went missing. Speculation arose that the influx of trespassers may have taken it, according to the original report.

It quickly became a huge discussion of history and memory and private and public ownership. Preservationists, armchair historians, and concerned citizens alike flocked to the cause of the stone marker. Many grew aware of the event in fear that the owner would go forward with a plan to develop parts of the birthplace into a residential area. (Note: No excavations have been done to verify that the house where Farragut was born is still there in some capacity)

A few weeks after the initial missing report, The Tennessean reported that the owner did in fact remove the marker, giving it to a private collector for safe keeping. Things have changed again this week, possibly for the better.

The Knoxville News reports this week that the owner of the property, Lylan Fitzgerald, would consider offering the marker up for public display either in a museum, nearby park, etc. Ms. Fitzgerald has at least expressed interest in offering it for public display - just not on her property.

The New York Times, 16 May 1900

Full Speed Ahead?
Craig Swain reported about the marker immediately following the initial disappearance. At that time in August (Tuesday 39 August), MetroPulse writer Jack Neely knew very little about the marker beyond the fact that it was recently missing. It is interesting that Neely reported that the owner did not tell her lawyer that she removed the marker and given it to a historic collector.

Read Craig's post on Marker Hunter for more information on the legality and controversy initially surrounding the marker. Both Craig's and the Knoxville News articles show that the loss of the marker, be it in either a physical or metaphysical sense, has drummed up support long before it went missing. In fact, speeches, dedications, articles, and blogs have sprouted up in recent years in popular support for keeping the site there (or as a National Park, etc.). Even Admiral DeLoach, the director of the Naval History and Heritage Command, spoke of the marker during a 2010 dedication of a nearby park in the town of Farragut.

The Debate Continues
Where is it now? According to the Knoxville News, it "might possibly be in Texas," presumably with the private collector she mentioned in The Tennessean. When approached with the idea to put it near her property again, she responded that that "is not going to happen."

Surprisingly, the reaction of the marker's possibility for public viewing has stirred up quite a bit of commentary, with 75 responses from readers in just a few days. Ranging from the poignant to the absurd, these comments dictate how the general public truly feels about preserving a valuable piece of American and naval history.

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Admiral Farragut is one of the most famous naval officers in the history of the United States. Nobody would dispute that. Having the marker dedicated by an officer equally as influential (Admiral Dewey) stands reason to give this debate some national attention. Should it stay there? Should it go? Our collective memory is held captive by these recent events.

What do you think? Please your thoughts here or tweet them @civilwarnavy

Ward Room (and dogs) of USS Miami

2011-12-02T09:26:00.000-05:00

For Friday, we present this image that is the subject of a make your own caption contest on the Hampton Roads Naval Museum's Facebook page (winner gets an HRNM challenge coin and other SWAG!). This is the ward room of the double ender gunboat USS Miami. With what looks like two English Springer Spaniel water dogs on hand, the officer recently returned from what looks like a duck hunting expedition in the waters of North Carolina. The vessel is most famous for dueling with the ironclad CSS Albermarle and barely escaped with her life.

Photograph technology being what was in the 1860s, exposure times were very long. This typically resulted in very stiff looking subjects or at the very least, obviously posed shots. This particular image, while posed, is unusual in that its subjects are quite relaxed (with one officer looking down right annoyed and others trying to get glimpse of the week's news).

New Images of USS Cumberland & CSS Florida Wrecks

2011-11-29T09:08:00.000-05:00

USS Cumberland, starboard side

USS Cumberland, bow looking forward

CSS Florida, from top

CSS Florida, starboard side

The Hampton Roads Naval Museum (HRNM) recently received these stunning 3-D images of the sloop-of-war USS Cumberland and the cruiser CSS Florida. The images were taken by technicians from Adavanced Underwater Surveys, Inc., using their Wrecksight(TM) software during the June 2011 stabilization survey project of the two shipwrecks. The project was sponsored by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's Marine Sanctuaries Division, the Naval History and Heritage Command's Underwater Archeology Division, and HRNM (also part of NHHC). The Navy and NOAA conduct surveys like these to ensure that the sites have not been disturbed.

The ironclad CSS Virginia rammed and sank Cumberland on March 8, 1862 on the first day of the Battle of Hampton Roads. Shortly after being brought back from Brazil under tow, Florida sank just a few hundred yards away from Cumberland in 1864 under mysterious circumstances.

Both wrecks under the protection of Federal law and artifacts from both vessels can be seen at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum.

Welles considers torpedo attack on CSS Virginia

2011-11-28T10:12:00.002-05:00

As the Union Army commanders dithered over attacking Confederate-held Norfolk and Portsmouth, the Union Navy reeled under the attack of CSS Virginia.

What were steady rumors flowing across Hampton Roads about the Confederates building a new kind of warship out of Merrimack became published fact when a New York Herald reporter, Bradley Sillick Osbon with extensive service in the Navy, rowed “a Hellgate pilotboat” with muffled oars from Fortress Monroe to the naval shipyard.

Drawing close to the vessel on a foggy night, “I fixed her outlines and proportions in my mind and returning undiscovered wrote a description of her for the Herald, and made a sketch for Harper's Weekly.” Osbon reported his findings to the aged Major General John Wool, commander of the fortress and a veteran of the War of 1812, and offered to lead a boarding party to sink the ship before it could leave the yard. Like Army officers before and after in Hampton Roads, Wool demurred. Sinking ships, even attacking warships, were what navies did.

Osbon, dismissing Flag Officer Louis Goldsborough, the senior Union Navy officer, as overly cautious, did not pursue the matter with him. If he had probed, Osbon would have learned that the blockade commander had warned Washington that “she will, in all probability, prove to exceedingly formidable,” especially if accompanied by fast-moving shallow-draft gunboats.

--------------

In the winter of 1861-1862, more and more naval officers in Hampton Roads wanted the Army to destroy Merrimack before it could threaten the Union’s tenuous control of Hampton Roads by re-taking Southside Hampton Roads. McClellan, now commanding the Army of the Potomac, eventually received the Navy’s proposal to attack the port of Norfolk and the Gosport shipyard in Portsmouth, but, like Wool on the scene, did nothing with it.

Congress and sloop Cumberland paid the price for these months of dithering. They were the first ships sunk by Merrimack, now christened CSS Virginia, in the Battle of Hampton Roads in March, 1862. Commander William Smith, who had turned over command to Lieutenant Joseph B. Smith a few days earlier, was still on board when Merrimack attacked. Congress was only able to fire two of its stern guns in its defense. It didn’t slow the ironclad down. When Lieutenant Smith was killed in the fighting, Commander Smith ordered Congress’ colors struck at 4 p.m. The frigate had been engaged with CSS Virginia for about 30 minutes.

The threat that Smith had been forced to ignore to defend against mine attacks remained a menacing force even after John Ericsson’s Monitor battled the Confederate ironclad to a draw. The Union Navy in Hampton Roads and in Washington were now frantically searching for any way to rid themselves of this enemy. It did not appear likely that Monitor was capable of sinking Virginia; and as long as it was able to fight the wooden ships of the Union Navy in Tidewater Virginia were in great danger.

A little more than a month after the battle and as the Union Army was descending on Tidewater in preparation for the Peninsula campaign, lawyer and self-described patriot, H.K. Lawrence offered Welles his ideas on how to sink the Confederate ironclad and two other Confederate vessels, Jamestown and Yorktown, at the naval shipyard. With those three vessels out of action, the Union Navy would control Hampton. Roads. At first he put the prize money he wanted for sinking the ironclad at $500,000 and the two smaller steamers at $100,000 each.

Although the price was high, Welles was interested.

If the Confederates could use submarine explosives to destroy ships so could the Union, Lawrence wrote. He first proposed receiving 2,000 pounds of gunpowder, later reduced to 1,500 pounds, to build “four submarine armors” at the Washington Arsenal at a cost not to exceed $1,800 and in unspecified ways to ship those “armors” to Fortress Monroe and from there to destroy CSS Virginia by May 9. The attacks on Jamestown and Yorktown were dropped in later correspondence, and Lawrence reduced the suggested prize for sinking the ironclad to $100,000.

Still unanswered in the correspondence were any details of how the attack was to be carried out. He likely either intended to float the mines toward Virginia and have them explode on contact or draw close enough to it to place the explosives under the ironclad to detonate them electronically.

Welles was considering Lawrence’s plan out of desperation. He knew his wooden ships were no match for the Confederate ironclad, and the Monitor was doing all it could to protect the troop build-up. Yet even knowing all that, Union Army commanders ignored the threat Virginia posed to all their operations in Hampton Roads.

Finally, at President Abraham Lincoln’s personal insistence after he surveyed the Confederates’ hold on Southside Hampton Roads from the water, the Union Army moved on Norfolk and Portsmouth May 10.

Reeling from the long-delayed attack, the Confederates scuttled Virginia and Confederate States (one of the Navy’s six original frigates) off Craney Island because they had too deep a draught to go up the James River to safety in Richmond and burned Germantown, Plymouth, Jesup, Norfolk, Portsmouth, and William Seddon.

From July, 1861 through May, 1862, Union Navy officers had been pre-occupied with defending themselves against a mine attack or how to use mines to destroy the Confederacy’s great warship with mines before it could strike again. Within weeks, they were confronting new mine threats past the Curle in the James River, just below Richmond. The mine ranges set in the water close by large gun emplacements on Drury’s Bluff and the south bank and Chaffin’s Farm on the north were effective and deadly. Unlike New Orleans, the Union Navy even with its attack gunboats never succeeded in taking Richmond from the river.

Lawrence’s scheme to sink Virginia as bold as it seemed in letters and as desperate as it would have been in practice had been overcome by old-fashioned events.

Updates and Admiral's Row: Week of 21 November 2011

2011-11-22T14:39:00.000-05:00

On This Day: 21 November 2011:

Coming from our friends at the Museum of the Confederacy: On this day in 1861, CSA forts McRee, Barrancas, & the Pensacola Navy Yard were bombarded by Union naval guns & Ft. Pickens.

You can see a more incorporated outlook HERE via Huffington Post.

Around the Internet/Blogosphere:

"See the Elephant:" Civil War Monitor blogger Laura June Davis posted an interesting quote from Confederate States Navy officer Douglas French Forrest last week (17 November) about his experiences aboard CSS Rappahannock. Let's just say he was a little disturbed, but not sick.

Admiral's Row: Week of 21 November 2011

This week's Admiral's Row features a new follower of the week (@shoosies), who has done a terrific job in re- our information via Facebook and Twitter. Thanks a lot @shoosies!

For more information on the "Admiral's Row" social media incentive, please go to THIS POST for more information, or email matthew.t.eng@navy.mil for more information.

We hope everyone has a safe and happy Thanksgiving holiday.

Union Navy Fends Off Mine Attacks in Hampton Roads.

2011-11-21T15:49:00.007-05:00

Early in the Civil War, it wasn’t the electrically-triggered torpedoes set up in long and deadly water ranges that later so troubled Union Navy officers in the upper James River, on the Cape Fear River in North Carolina, or just outside the port cities of Charleston and Mobile. Their concerns in Hampton Roads centered on floating torpedoes or mines in wooden casks and the use of the tides and currents to carry them into their anchorages. For almost a year, mines in Hampton Roads were never far from Union Navy leaders minds – first in how to defend against them and later how to employ them to destroy the greatest menace they would face in the war.

Matthew F. Maury

The Union Navy had escaped disaster in July before the Battle of Bull Run when Commander Matthew Fontaine Maury and his raiding party had floated a number of mines toward the anchored fleet off Fortress Monroe in Hampton Roads. Maury's idea was to let the tide and current carry the powder-laden oak casks toward the ships. The pairs of casks were connected by a span of rope about 600 feet in length, and corks kept the span afloat. The explosives, contained in the barrels, were submerged, and the triggers were in the barrelheads.

The idea behind the plan was this: As the span became entangled in the ship's hawse and the barrels were pulled alongside by the tidal wash, the tightening line would activate the triggers, setting off a fuse igniting the powder that would explode below the vessels' waterlines.

When he thought he was in correct position, Maury quietly ordered the first mines released. Then the next set. Finally, all were safely off. The twenty-five Confederates tensed, waiting to hear the explosions as they hurriedly rowed back toward Sewell's Point stillunchallenged by any Union patrol vessels.

As they drew closer and closer to safety, the Confederates heard only their muffled oars. There were no shattering blasts, secondary explosions, and alarm bells and trumpet calls, only the sounds of a summer Tidewater night.

All knew the raid had failed. Ashore, Maury scrutinized each detail to pinpoint what had gone wrong. "I attributed it to the fact that such a fuse would not burn under a pressure of 20 feet of water” and vowed to try again. When Union forces found the washed ashore mines later, they had another explanation: wet powder.

In late October, another Maury-designed raid again used floating mines to attack frigate Congress off Newport News in Hampton Roads, but it too had gone awry. Nonetheless, Captain Louis Goldsborough, the senior Union officer in the area, warned the skipper of Congress, Commander William Smith, a week after the latest attack to “be on the alert for submarine infernal machines” that could be rowed close to the ship and set adrift to become ensnared in its propeller and set off the explosives in their casks.

Smith wrote back in early November that he was protecting Congress as best he could with a frame in the shape of the letter A floating nearby, placing booms alongside it at night, and keeping grapnels at the ready in case a floating mine came near. Yet with all this attention paid to mines, Smith admitted that the most dangerous challenge to his ship, the raised Merrimack being outfitted with railroad iron and new powerful guns a few miles away in Portsmouth, was receiving scant attention.

“I have not yet devised any plan to defend against Merrimack unless it be with hard knocks.” - Commander William Smith

Artillery Duel at Pensacola Bay

2011-11-20T16:20:00.018-05:00

Artillery engagement on Pensacola Bay on 22-23 November 1861. Santa Rosa Island, Ft. Pickens, and Union batteries on the island are in the foreground; Pensacola Navy Yard and adjacent towns on the mainland are in the background. Source: Fla. Dept. of State on-line photo archive.

Angered by the Union Navy’s destruction of the privateer Judah in September 1861 (my 11 Sept 2011 post), Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg, commanding the CS Army forces garrisoning Pensacola and the Pensacola Navy Yard, sent a force of 1,200 soldiers to Santa Rosa Island. The force landed at night on 8 October 1861 and assaulted the camp of the 6th New York, a Zouave regiment. The Union troops were initially routed, but reinforcements from Ft. Pickens helped them reform and they pushed the Confederate forces back, who then departed the island by the next morning.

In response to this attack, and the increasing size of the Confederate force garrisoning Pensacola, Col. Harvey Brown, now commanding the Union forces in Ft. Pickens on Santa Rosa Island, ordered his artillery to open fire on the mainland on 22 November. The army artillery was supplemented by gunfire from the steam frigate USS Niagra and steam sloop USS Richmond. The Confederates returned the Union gunfire. For two days, the bombardment continued, with thousands of rounds expended by both sides. Ft. McRee was destroyed by the gunfire from the US Navy ships, and portions of the Navy Yard and adjacent villages were set on fire from the barrage. Richmond suffered one sailor killed and seven injured by fire from the Confederate batteries. Hostilities ceased on the night of 23 November.

Steam frigate USS Niagra. Source: USN History and Heritage Command on-line photo library.

Hampton Roads Surface Navy Association Talk: Steam and Iron

2011-11-17T12:32:00.001-05:00

Last month (October 19, 2011), I had the fortunate opportunity to speak at the Hampton Roads Surface Navy Association meeting and luncheon at Vista Point Club (Naval Station Norfolk). The title of my talk, "Iron and Steam: The Battle of Hampton Roads" focused on the role the event played into the creation of the modern Surface Navy.

Here are some of the pictures from the event. Special thanks to MC2 Martie for the photography and former staff of COMSECONDFLT for attending the lecture. It was a special honor to meet MCPON Bushey.

HMCM Modglin presenting me with coin and SNA ballcap

MCPON Duane Bushey (ret.) and FLEET Tom Howard (ret.) chatting at event

MCPON Bushey, VADM Donnell, Matthew Eng, HMCM Modglin

USS Hartford Stern Emblem

2011-11-16T10:48:00.004-05:00

Stern emblem of the Hartford today (HRNM)

During a recent trip to HRNM's collection storage, my coworker and fellow CWN 150 blogger Laura Orr snapped a photo of a recently acquired object in the collection: the stern emblem of the USS Hartford. The ship, captained by first Admiral David Glasgow Farragut at the battle of Mobile Bay, spent the remainder of its post-war career in disrepair at shipyards up and down the east coast. Decommissioned for the last time in 1926, she eventually sank at her berth in 1956 at the Norfolk Navy Yard (Portsmouth, VA).

Stern emblem visible Mare Island’s dry dock #1 in October/November 1899 (U.S. Navy)

Pieces of the Hartford scattered across the United States following its sinking, from California to Connecticut. The emblem and several sideboards were previously on display at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum.

Ode to Civil War Naval Engineers and Firemen

2011-11-10T13:54:00.004-05:00

USS Pensacola's engineers (center and right) talk to one of Pensacola's line officers (at left)

Attempting to cold crank the boiler

Steam propulsion was one of the great advances in marine technology. It allowed the captain of a ship to go where he want, when he wanted. Their countless examples in the Civil War of how steam propulsion allowed both navies to conduct operations their forefathers never could have dream of. The technology, however, came at a steep human price as someone had to be in the boiler room manging the machines.

In their history The Steam Navy of the United States, authors Frank Marion Bennett and Robert Weir published a series of cartoons of the engineering department aboard the steam sloop-of-war USS Pensacola during the Civil War. Like any good editorial cartoon, the images were meant to both entertain and enlighten about the plight of its subject.

"Going On Watch, Coming Off Watch"

Operating the water pump to the boiler

"A Little Oil"

"Smuggling the oil"

New Guest Blogger: John Grady

2011-11-10T13:40:00.001-05:00

It is my pleasure to welcome aboard the newest guest blogger of the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial, John Grady. Grady is an accomplished historian and professional. He has contributed to USNI's Naval History on Civil War subjects, served as lead interviewer for the Naval Historical Foundation's Oral History Program, written book reviews on CWN topics for Militarylifestyles.com and the Naval Historical Foundation, and served as managing editor of the Navy Times.

He is currently completing a biography of Matthew F. Maury.
Welcome aboard, John!

The Navy Strikes at Belmont

2011-11-07T15:27:00.009-05:00

With Leonidas Polk's Confederate army straddling the Mississippi in the autumn of 1861, local Union commander Brig. General U.S. Grant prepared to neutralize half the threat.

Polk had placed a significant portion of his force on the western Missouri bank near Belmont, where several regiments of infantry made camp. On the eastern side of the river towered the bluffs of Columbus, Kentucky. Atop those bluffs stood several heavy artillery emplacements, and through their elevation and the protection of more Confederate infantry in on the Kentucky shore, these guns controlled navigation on the Mississippi River. The range of the rebel artillery was even great enough to reach across to Missouri and well upriver. Grant wouldn't attack the Confederate positions at Columbus, instead he planned to assault and capture the rebel force isolated on the western shore.

Grant's 3,000-strong army was ferried by five transports south from Cairo, and escorted by the timberclads Lexington and Tyler. Grant disembarked upriver (northwest) from Belmont on November 7th, and led his men eastward and overland for a surprise attack. After sharp fighting that morning, Union troops occupied the Confederate encampment while routed enemy troops fled to the river bottoms.

At the same time Grant fought on land, Commander Henry A. Walke took the Lexington and Tyler downriver to duel the Confederate shore batteries. The first two encounters were brief, and though both sides exchanged heavy fire, no damage was done. The third duel, however, resulted in one Union sailor killed and two wounded. The Tyler even sustained damage from at least two hits. Walke realized his pair of steamers could do little to silence the bluff batteries, and though the timberclads diverted Confederate attention, the Union naval commander withdrew upriver to defend the idle troop transports.

But Union victory on land was not complete. Grant's raw troops became disorderly after their victory, and General Polk took advantage of the confusion to transfer fresh brigades from Columbus to Missouri. The Confederates attacked Grant's confused force, and the U.S. contingent made a fighting retreat to their original landing area. As Grant's men converged on the waiting transports, Polk's infantry swarmed closely behind and threatened to capture the Union army before they could depart.

Commander Walke, seeing Grant's perilous situation, maneuvered the Tyler and Lexington into firing positions and raked the closely grouped Confederates with grape, canister, and shell. The effect of the naval bombardment was great enough to halt Confederate momentum. The timberclads bought just enough time to ensure Grant's escape. Both armies suffered 600-700 casualties. Who won the Battle of Belmont? It's hard to tell, but both sides claimed victory.

Though this wasn't the first naval action in the West (the timberclads had traded a few shots with the C.S.S. Jackson in September) it was the first major engagement for the riverine fleet. More important action would quickly follow.

Sources

The Timberclads in the Civil War: The Lexington, Conestoga and Tyler on the Western Water, by Myron J. Smith, Jr.
The Battle of Belmont: Grant Strikes South by Nathaniel Cheairs Hughes, Jr.

The Confederate Navy at Port Royal

2011-11-06T14:44:00.005-05:00

Flag Officer Josiah Tattnall and his mosquito fleet saw their share of action during the Battle for Port Royal. Tattnall had a reputation for aggressiveness, and he certainly displayed it at this engagement. On 4 November 1861 Flag Officer DuPont of the Union fleet sent the survey vessel Vixen in to chart the configuration of the bars and channel into Port Royal, accompanied by the gunboats Ottawa, Seneca, Pembina and Penguin. Tattnall, on his flagship, the steamer CSS Savannah, and with three armed tugs (Lady Davis, Resolute, and Sampson), bravely headed in towards the USN vessels. Gunfire from Ottawa, Seneca, and Pembina drove him back to his anchorage in Skull Creek. The next day, USN gunboats led by Ottawa went in to probe the defensive capabilities of the Confederate shore batteries and the CSN fleet attacked again. This time the Confederate flotilla was under the command of John Newland Maffitt, who, as Robert Browning notes, “went at them” when he saw the enemy vessels steaming into the harbor. A shot from the Seneca’s forward 11 inch pivot gun struck the Savannah and again the Union gunfire forced the Confederate ships to withdraw. Tattnall was furious with Maffitt, claiming that he did not authorize an attack, and of course Maffitt believed otherwise. Tattnall relieved Maffitt of command, but the two officers later settled their dispute. The day the Union offensive began (7 November), the mosquito fleet, back under Tattnall’s command, again stood out to take on the USN attacking fleet. A flanking column of Union gunboats (Bienville, Seneca, Penguin, Augusta, and Curlew) was assigned to keep watch on the mosquito fleet and fend off any attacks, which they did. Tattnall, as he reluctantly withdrew, dipped his blue ensign three times as a salute to his old friend DuPont. Later that day, Seneca went after the Confederate vessels and drove them back to Skull Creek. After the capitulation of the forts, the CSN vessels helped evacuate the Confederate garrison.

Image of the "90-day" or Unadilla class gunboats. Ottawa, Pembina, and Seneca are all shown. Source: Naval History and Heritage Command

New Port Royal Commemorative Events

2011-11-04T09:02:00.001-04:00

Our friends at the South Carolina Civil War 150th pointed out to us some other commemorative events coming up in the upcoming week. Here is a quick list:

The Port Royal Plantation Commemorative Event has a great full list of event details (how to get there, parking, etc.) Got to it HERE.

Mike Coker Luncheon Lecture sponsored by Powder Magazine (November 10, 2011)
Description: November 1861, the South was winning the War. The Confederacy had been victorious at Fort Sumter and Manassas and the blockade of Southern ports was a farce! The Federals needed to turn the tide. The largest fleet ever assembled by the U.S. set its sights on the SC coast! Join historian Michael Coker on the 150th Anniversary of this largely forgotten pivotal battle of the war. Lunch will be provided by AW Shucks. $18

Battle of Port Royal Boat Tour (November 12, 2011) (updated)
Time: 10:00 am - 4:00 pm
Description: The University of South Carolina at Beaufort is sponsoring this boat tour about the Battle of Port Royal in November 1861. Noted historians Stephen Wise and Dr. Lawrence Rowland will lead the tour. $115, including lectures, lunch, boat fee and handouts. Call 843-521-4147 or kingsley@ucsb.edu

Brother Against Brother at Port Royal

2011-11-03T12:21:00.005-04:00

Percival Drayton was born in the South, but remained loyal to the Union when war came. This resulted in a situation that is often referenced in the study of the Civil War - brother against brother. At the Battle of Port Royal, Percival Drayton commanded the Pocahontas. His brother, Thomas Fenwick Drayton, was a Confederate brigadier general and was also present at Port Royal. During the battle, the Pocahontas fired upon Fort Walker, where Thomas was in command.
Percival wrote in a letter dated 30 November 1861 from Port Royal: "To think of my pitching here right into such a nest of my relations, my brother, William Heyward, Tatnall &c it is very hard but I can not exactly see the difference between their fighting against me and I against them except that their cause is as unholy a one as the world has ever
seen and mine just the reverse."

Interpretive marker at Fort Walker
Civil War Letters of Percival Drayton

Storms off the South Carolina coast

2011-11-02T20:14:00.015-04:00

The morning of 3 November 1861 off the coast of Port Royal, SC was stormy, both literally and figuratively. The coast was still being brushed by the trailing remnants of a hurricane that had gone by over the past few days (post by Matt on 29 August), and the storm clouds of war were beginning to gather. After weathering the hurricane on their journey south from Hampton Roads, elements of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron were assembling off Port Royal in preparation to take the anchorage for use as a base of operations. As detailed by Matt in that prior post, the expedition was beat up somewhat by the storm, but managed to make it through with relatively minimal loss of life and ships. The Army suffered the greater loss, in terms of ships carrying equipment and supplies and the failure to make the rendezvous of the small steamers which were to tow the surfboats loaded with soldiers to the beaches. Flag Officer Samuel F. DuPont arrived the afternoon of 3 November in the flagship USS Wabash, and during the day, other warships of the squadron and US Army transports carrying troops under the command of Gen. Thomas W. Sherman rendezvoused with the flagship. During this time they were being watched by Confederate soldiers in Forts Walker and Beauregard and by Flag Officer Josiah Tattnall of the Confederate Navy, with his “mosquito fleet.” The stage was set for the Battle of Port Royal to begin. Illustration source: US Naval History and Heritage Command.

Navy Leadership at Port Royal

2011-11-01T14:10:00.001-04:00

As described in our previous post, this week we will be highlighting the Battle of Port Royal. This was an historic event for the United States (Union) Navy, as it was the first major test of the fleet against formidable, shore based defenses (Forts Walker and Beauregard). Today's post centers around the two commanders responsible for coordinating the naval attack and defense of the port: Samuel Francis Du Pont and Josiah Tattnall.

Union Navy Leadership: Samuel Francis Du Pont

Union forces specifically needed an adequate and well executed naval component in order for the mission to be successful. This would prove a daunting task for officials in Washington as well as the newly installed South Atlantic Blockading Squadron Commander Samuel Francis Du Pont. Du Pont knew about blockade strategy already in his naval career, serving on the blockade of California in the twighlight days of the Mexican American War. The seasoned Flag Officer, who served in the United States Navy since 1815, took command of the SABC on 18 September 1861. He would uphold the command until June 1863. Port Royal would arguably be his greatest test, now in the waning years of his life.

For the aging Squadron Commander, preparations were anything but slow. Decisions were made so fast that Du Pont felt officials in Washington, including President Lincoln, were not being realistic to the start date of the expedition (originally in early October). The burden of leadership indeed weighed on Du Pont. In coordination with Brig. General Thomas Sherman's 13,000 troops, 77 ships under Du Pont would assemble at Port Royal.

If all went well, this early engagement would be a hallmark of combined Army/Navy operations utilized by Union forces during the war.

Confederate Navy Leadership: Josiah Tattnall

For the Confederacy, Captain Josiah Tattnal would be responsible for the Southern naval defense of Port Royal. Although Tattnall opposed secession, he nonetheless resigned his U.S. Navy commission and became a senior naval officer for the state navy of Georgia, his home state. As the war progressed, he soon found himself in command of the Georgia and South Carolina coastline, which included Port Royal. He would have very little resources to put against the amassed fleets: several converted tugboats and harbor vessels with 2 mounted cannon.

It would seem that any subsequent defense of Port Royal would have to rely on its hastily built up forts (Walker and Beauregard). The forts would become the focus of both Union and Confederate forces in the days to come before the attack.

Port Royal Week for CWN 150 Bloggers

2011-10-29T14:38:00.001-04:00

We are less than a week away from commemorating the sesquicentennial anniversary of the battle of Port Royal. Although we are a few days away from the official assemblage of the force responsible for the assault, it is nonetheless important to begin documenting this important (if not THE most important) naval event of 1861. This is the first of several posts chronicling the Port Royal Expedition.

If you haven't looked yet, there are already several posts about the Port Royal Expedition published earlier this year (29 August and 21 October). This week will focus on the historical significance and implications of the successful Union attack and

According to the Island Packet, Port Royal Plantation will hold a sesquicentennial commemoration of the battle on November 5th from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Hilton Head Mayor Drew Laughlin will began the formalized festivities at 12 p.m. with an introductory welcome to guests. This will be followed by several events, including a historical presentation by Charleston author Michael Coker, stories by local resident John Witherspoon, Civil War music, colors presentation by Hilton Head HS NJROTC, salvos from Fort Walker, and a final presentation of "TAPS." It looks to be an exciting day. The event is free to the public. For more information, please go to the article HERE.

For more information on the Port Royal Plantation event, here is the information:

Port Royal Plantation
10 Coggins Point Rd
Hilton Head Island, SC 29928
843.681.5114

According to the Beaufort County Historical Resources blog, two events hosted by the BDC (Beaufort District Collection) on the 7th of November will also highlight the sesquicentennial anniversary of the battle. As posted on the blog:

BDC@ Bluffton Branch Library – Mike Coker, author of The Battle of Port Royal will speak about the players, actions, and aftermath of the battle at 2:00 pm. The Bluffton Branch Library is located at 120 Palmetto Way.
The BDC@ Penn Center – Mike Coker will be joined by Dr. Lawrence Rowland, Stephen Hoffius, and Neil Baxley in Frisell Community House to discuss the Battle and the Civil War as it transpired here in Beaufort District. Program begins at 6:30 pm. Meet and greet the authors, get them to sign their books after the session.

If you are attending these events, please send your photos or any information to matthew.t.eng@navy.mil or tweet us @civilwarnavy. We will repost it here on the blog.

Full Speed Ahead,

Matthew T. Eng

Drawings of a Mad Man/Genius-John Ericsson's Monitor Concept

2011-10-28T14:38:00.008-04:00

Ericsson first drew a traverse sketch of his idea and then drew over it with a long view. As one can see Ericsson "showed his work" by working out the math on top of the drawings.

While these look like sketches drawn by a mad man at 3 in the morning who had not been to bed in over 72 hours, these are actually inventor/designer/engineer John Ericsson's 1854 concept of a "monitor" type warship. After much political stalling, the Ironclad Board would formally endorse his design in 1861. The idea behind Monitor, however, had been shuffling around in Ericsson's head long before the outbreak of war.

A rough idea of his monitor's submerged propeller system.

According to a 1911 biography The Life Of John Ericsson, the Swedish-born engineer had the idea from early on in his professional career. Monitor, according to Ericsson, was not just a class warship, but rather a fundamental shift in the way architects should look at warship design. He wrote "The monitor of 1854 was the visible part of my system, and its grand features were excluded from its published drawings and description...An impregnable and partially submerged instrument for destroying ships of war has been one of the hobbies of my life. I had the plan matured long before I left England. As for protecting war engines for naval purposes with iron, the idea is as old as my recollection."

Ericsson's "monitor system" not only was about designing ships with armored turrets, but also building them with a submerged screw propeller that was safe from hostile fire. In Ericsson's mind, the water surrounding a ship was just as important as any metallic armor protecting the exposed area.

CWN 150 Updates

2011-10-26T14:51:00.003-04:00

Farragut Statue Undergoing Much Needed Restorations (Dnainfo/Mary Johnson)

FARRAGUT STATUE CHECKUP AND CLEANING

Augustus Saint-Gaudens, sculptor

Long overdue, the David Glasgow Farragut Monument in New York City is currently undergoing an annual checkup and cleaning. The monument, made by master sculptor and "American Renaissance" pioneer Augustus Saint-Gaudens, depicts a brave and courageous Admiral standing 15.5 feet tall in Madison Square Park. According to Mary Johnson from New York's DNAInfo.com, the statue was due for a "much-needed bath." Many who are unfamiliar with Saint-Gaudens work will easily recognize his most famous piece, the Robert Shaw/54th Mass. Monument.

Originally dedicated in 1881, the monument still rests peacefully, if not a big dirty, in the "Big Apple." The sculpture is now part of the Municipal Art Society's "Adopt-a-Monument" program. The cleaning will consist of cleaning the sculpture and its base. Armed with bamboo skewers, dedicated individuals like Cameron Wilson take the time to notice the blowing drapery as depicted in the sculpture. It is as if Farragut is still standing on the rigging shouting those famous words at Mobile Bay. They are doing some fine working to restore some of our nation's most treasured monuments in the five boroughs. The article includes an excellent picture gallery of the restoration process.

Read the full article from DNAInfo.com HERE.

Around the Blogosphere

The Monitor Begins
This week marks the 150th anniversary of the USS Monitor's construction. According to Mariners' Museum VP of Museum Collections & Programs Anna Holloway's Facebook account: "‎150 Years ago today, with the ink barely dry on the construction contract, workers at Continental Iron Works in Greenpoint, Brooklyn began work on Ericsson's Battery. You might know her better as the USS Monitor. :)." We couldn't have said it any better. Shoot over to the Civil War Connections blog to read more about the Monitor's sesquicentennial construction.

USS Onondaga Ship Model
There is an excellent post by historian and CWN 150 blog contributor Gordon Calhoun on the Hampton Roads Naval Museum blog page. The article focuses on the model of the double-turreted USS Onondaga, which is located in the HRNM Civil War gallery. The post includes a contemporary sketch of the ship by Aldred Waud. Go to the blog post HERE.

Admirals Row: Week of 24 OCT (What is Admiral's Row?)

The River War in Florida

2011-10-21T17:21:00.016-04:00

Union Navy steamer skirmishing with Confederate sharpshooters "near Fernandina, Fla." Possibly the Amelia or St. Marys Rivers. Source: Fla. Dept. of State online photo archive.

CWN 150 Coordinator Matt Eng had some neat links in his “October Updates” post of 13 Oct 2011. One featured an article in the Washington Post that concluded in part “. . . the Civil War was a river war.” This got me thinking about the role of the US Navy in Florida during the war, and that to a great extent we can say the same thing; it was very much a “river war.” For most of the conflict, Confederate militia and home guard controlled much of the interior of the state (roads and railroads), and so the US Army depended a lot on the Navy to transport their men, animals, and material. The US Navy made a number of expeditions up the St. Johns River on the Florida east coast, which I will detail much more on the appropriate dates in 2012. Numerous cutting out expeditions to go after blockade runners and/or contraband were conducted by the US Navy on the rivers of both coasts in Florida. Even fictional accounts highlight the river war in Florida. In the novel “At the Edge of Honor” by Robert Macomber, a Union armed sloop commanded by Master Peter Wake engages in a nighttime firefight with two Confederate blockade runners on the Peace River, in southwest Florida:

“Now they could get a bearing on the enemy sounds, coming down the southern shore of the river, to the right of the Rosalie, and almost dead ahead of Thorton's boat. . . Without warning, a blast exploded on the right, followed by a volley of more blasts, as the men in Thorton's boat fired at the enemy. The light of the musket blasts flared out over the water and illuminated the (enemy) schooner for a brief moment. . . . Men on all the vessels were now shouting and screaming. Blasts and flames were coming from everywhere. . . Wake, seeing that the schooner was now just about at the line of anchored vessels and was firing into Thorton's boat, stood up and yelled as loud as he could, 'Fire, Durlon, fire!' The roar of the twelve-pounder overwhelmed all other noise and action. The flame it spewed out carried for twenty feet and lit up the entire river, clearly showing the damage along the starboard side of the schooner from the dozens of small rounds that had been packed into the canister ammunition. . . . The sound of the screaming and yelling and shooting from the schooner made it sound like a ship from hell as it continued out of control toward Wake's sloop.”

Captured schooner crewed by USN sailors from the USS Stars and Stripes skirmishes with dismounted Confederate cavalry on the Ochlockonee River, Florida. Source: Fla. Dept. of State online photo archive.

The Port Royal Expedition and the New York Times

2011-10-21T13:50:00.000-04:00

America's Armed Forces and the New York Times have not had the best of relationships over the years (see the Pentagon Papers and more recent spat over leaked e-mails from the National Security Agency to the newspaper). It is possible that the sour relationship began not in the 1960s, but rather the 1860s.

In September and October 1861, Flag officer Samuel Du Pont began assembling a fleet of warships, transports, and ground troops in Annapolis and Hampton Roads in preparation for a major offensive in South Carolina. The offensive's goal was take the excellent natural harbor of Port Royal, South Carolina and make it a base for the newly established South Atlantic Blockading Squadron.

As the engraving illustrates, the fleet was huge (94 ships) and in sight of the southern shore of Hampton Roads where any Confederate solider could see it. Nonetheless, Du Pont was furious when he saw this headline in the October 23, 1861 edition of the New York Times:

The article printed not only the number of ships in the fleet, but also the names of the ship's commanding officers and the names of regimental commanders. The fleet cleared Hampton Roads on October 25. Whether through the article or their own intelligence efforts, Confederate Secretary of War Judah Benjamin telegraphed his generals in South Carolina "the enemy's expedition is heading to South Carolina."

Carondelet: Then and Now

2011-10-18T17:23:00.011-04:00

As explained in earlier posts, James Eads was awarded many of the major naval building contracts in the western theater. He divvied up the work between several shipyards, but the Union Iron Works at Carondelet, Missouri hosted the lion's share of production.

Eads turned an already busy port town into a major naval center virtually overnight. His contract to construct the City-class gunboats (more about them soon) resulted in the building of four new ironclad warships in Carondelet: the Baron de Kalb, Louisville, Pittsburg, and most appropriately, the Carondelet.
The boatyards spanned across much of Carondelet's Mississippi riverfront property, ranging from the confluence of the River des Peres and Missisippi northeast past Marceau and Davis streets and along Vulcan Street. The warehouses and docks were supported by nearby rolling mills, sawmills, and foundries. Businesses like the R.C. Totten and Company Foundry in St. Louis provided much of the armor for the new vessels.

The City-class ships were finally completed in January 1862, and Carondelet's namesake ironclad would feature prominently in many of the upcoming battles for the west. Carondelet would continue to build more vessels, including many of the tinclads that were introduced later in the war.

(Image from Google Maps)

Today there's no evidence Eads's shipyards ever existed, though many other buildings from the Civil War-era remain elsewhere in town. The shoreline where ironclads were once built is now overgrown, and empty, decaying factories stand nearby. The area that was once the center of the marine ways is now the home of the New World Pasta factory. I visited Carondelet in July, and took these photos just before a storm blew in.

Admirals Row: Week of 16 October

2011-10-15T16:46:00.006-04:00

This week's Admiral's Row includes several great blogs and bloggers that are putting out some really great material about the role of the navies in the Civil War. A big Bravo Zulu to Craig Swain and his article on in the Civil War Monitor.

Tweeter of the Week: Civil War Monitor (@CivilWarMonitor)

Follower of the Week: Civil War Visions (@CivilWarVisions)

Site of the Week: Civil War Monitor

Picture of the Week: Portsmouth Navy Day 2011

Navy Birthday and October Updates

2011-10-13T12:31:00.004-04:00

Today marks the 236th birthday of the United States Navy. Revolutionary War hero and first President George Washington said it best when describing the needs of a Navy for the United States, past and present: "Without a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive." For more information on the 236th birthday of the United States Navy, please see these resource at the Naval History and Heritage Command website.

Tons of activity about the Civil War Navy on the interwebs. Of course, this week marks the beginning of Mason and Slidell's overseas assignment, ultimately leading to the infamous Trent Affair with Charles Wilkes. You can read a previous post about the Trent Affair HERE, or go to CivilWarHome.

USS Richmond near Baton Rouge, LA

"My Knees Knocked Together:" Civil War Visions Blog
Around the blogosphere, an interesting tidbit popped up on the Civil War Visions blog about a sailor's first reaction to combat. The text, taken from United States Sanitary Commission Soldiers' Letters From Camp, Battlefield, and Person, describes Walton Grinnell's eyewitness account of an engagement between the USS Richmond and the rebel steamer William H. Webb along the Mississippi River. For the 17 year old sailor aboard the Nyack, there was much cause for excitement. He ends his entry by saying, "Although I have before been under fire of musketry, yet I can fancy nothing comparable with the whizzing and bursting of rifle-shell." A very interesting bit of primary source information to read. It tells much of what sailors experienced in what historian John Keegan called the "Face of Battle." The Richmond would later take part in the capture of New Orleans.

By far, the most interesting article about the Civil War navies put out in the last few days should be credited to the Washington Post Lifestyle section. The article, titled "Battle of Ball's Bluff revealed a truth: The Civil War was a river war," describes how the small engagement turned Union fiasco can explain the complex nature of rivers and warfare during the five year conflict. The author of the article summarized the battle best: "sketchy information, a river too deep to ford, not enough boats, and soldiers who couldn’t swim." The article goes on to explain the "River Fact," justifying the importance of riverine combat in the West "both strategically and tactically." Check it out. A very interesting piece for the collection of our collective understanding of the Civil War navies, as much of the focus in the past few months has remained on land.

LH Marines from the Galena explain how a 3-pounder cannon works to a NMC sailor. (Eng)

HRNM/Civil War Navy 150 at Navy Day 2011 (Portsmouth, VA)
Hampton Roads Naval Museum Education Director Lee Duckworth and CWN 150 Coordinator Matthew T. Eng had a booth at Tuesday's Navy Day 2011 Event at Navy Medical Center (Portsmouth, VA). Various living history groups were in attendance, including the Tidewater Marine Living History Association and Galena Marine Ships Company. You can see the photo stream on the CWN 150 Facebook page HERE.

Events Updated
A few events were uploaded to the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial calendar. These events were submitted by "Seaman Rob" and the USS Ft. Henry Living History Association. The living history group is scheduled to appear at these Florida events. for more information, please go to http://www.ussforthenry.com/.

15 October: Seahorse Key Open House (Cedar Key, FL)
22-23 October: The Civil War in Jacksonville at Ft. Caroline National Monument (Jacksonville, FL)

Destruction of a Blockade Runner

2011-10-12T16:41:00.005-04:00

It’s characteristically the larger or more significant engagements that make it into the history books and articles on the Civil War Navies, but I’ve always thought that for every big event, there are dozens of small ones that don’t attract notice, and yet played a role in the ultimate outcome of the war. On 15 October 1861, Capt. John Marston of the steam frigate USS Roanoke, on blockade off Charleston, SC, reported sighting a “large sail.” He dispatched the steam gunboats USS Flag and USS Monticello to chase down this unknown vessel, and was subsequently joined by the sail sloop USS Vandalia. The Monticello reported back that it was the blockade runner Thomas Watson, which had run aground on Stono Reef as she tried to evade the pursuing blockaders and get into Charleston Harbor. The runner was found abandoned by boat crews from the Roanoke, Monticello and Vandalia. Intelligence reports had suggested that Watson was carrying arms, but a thorough search of the entire ship indicated that she was carrying “salt, blankets, flannel, a few smaller articles.” Marston’s orders to the cutting out party were to attempt to free the Watson from the reef, but she was stuck fast, so his orders included burning the ship after removing as much of the cargo as possible. This was completed by 16 October 1861. Illustration source: Library of Congress "Civil War Drawings" collection online.

Civil War Navy Overview

2011-10-11T23:17:00.000-04:00

In preparation for tonight's Navy Day 2011 event at Portsmouth Medical Center (pictures to follow soon), I created a short overview clip of the goals and objectives of the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial. Please feel free to stream the video here, or on the Civil War Navy Youtube page. Please send any feedback in the comments below, on twitter @civilwarnavy, or email me directly at matthew.t.eng@navy.mil. Enjoy.

Full Speed Ahead,

Matthew T. Eng

Harvest Moon Marker

2011-10-09T14:03:00.007-04:00

From the Georgetown, South Carolina Sun News:

Georgetown has its fair share of history and 57 state Historical Markers to prove it.
This weekend, No. 58 will be unveiled.
As of Saturday, anyone traveling along Front Street in downtown Georgetown will be able to read the story of the Union Navy vessel USS Harvest Moon thanks to the Arthur Manigault Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and Battery White Camp of the Sons of the Confederate Veterans.

In March 1865 the USS Harvest Moon sank when it struck a torpedo floated into the Winyah Bay by Confederate Capt. Thomas Daggett. Daggett built his torpedo in the second floor of a store at 633 Front St. in Georgetown.
The smokestack of the 193-foot Harvest Moon can still be seen at low tide in the bay and there will be a tour boat trip out to the site of the vessel after the unveiling ceremony on Saturday [October 8]

The sinking of the USS Harvest Moon was one of the closing acts of the coastal operations in South Carolina. Although Federals had occupied Georgetown and surrounding batteries in late February 1865, the retreating Confederates left behind mines in the channels of Winyah Bay. A converted side-wheel steamer, the loss of a lightly armed ship like the Harvest Moon normally would be a small matter. But Admiral John Dahlgren was on-board at the time. Thus the Harvest Moon has the distinction being the only US Navy flagship sunk in the war.

The Harvest Moon was not salvaged, and left in shallow waters. In the 1960s divers surveyed the wreck.

The wreck remains in the waters of Winyah Bay today. And now there is a marker. Perhaps someday there will be some archeological work?

View of Winyah Bay from Battery White (Photo by Craig Swain)

The Hatteras Expedition - One More Time

2011-10-06T17:31:00.005-04:00

CWN 150 Blogger Gordon has provided coverage of the US Navy’s first big operation of the Civil War, the Hatteras Expedition, in two prior posts (18 Aug 2011 and 21 Sept 2011), so I certainly don’t mean to duplicate prior content. That said, I had to share with you this illustration I found in the online collection “Civil War Drawings” on the Library of Congress web site.

The picture struck me because it is so dynamic; it resonates with activity. In the right foreground are infantry companies forming up on the beach. In the left foreground additional troops are coming ashore in the surf, and behind them ships boats are bringing in more. Towards the background on the left, the Revenue Cutter Harriet Lane appears to be providing close inshore gun support, foreshadowing the role played by destroyers in the D-Day landings at Normandy. In the background in line-ahead formation are the “big boys”: the steam frigate Minnesota, the sailing sloop Cumberland, the steam frigate Wabash, and the side-wheel steam gunboat Susquehanna. The target of their gunfire is in the right background, Fort Clarke, and you can see the shells bursting over the fort.

Admiral's Row: Week of 2 October

2011-10-06T10:37:00.002-04:00

Last week we debuted a new feature on the site to encourage interaction with frequent visitors and fans of the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial (Facebook/Youtube/Twitter/Linkedin, etc.). Here are this week's inductees into "Admiral's Row." Remember, the more you participate, the better your chances are of being featured!

Tweeter of the Week: Craig Swain (@caswain01)

Craig is one of the guest bloggers for the CWN 150. He is also the author of the very interesting blog "Marker Hunter."

Follower of the Week: Museum of the Confederacy (@moc1896)

Site of the Week: Museum of the Confederacy Youtube

Picture of the Week: USS Baron de Kalb

Cutlass Drill

2011-10-05T16:38:00.006-04:00

A sailor’s typical day on a Union Navy blockading ship was filled with drill; fire drill, general quarters, gun drill, small arms drill, and on and on. Part of this repertoire was cutlass drill using “single sticks,” pieces of wood the same dimension as the standard 1861 Ames cutlass. Use of these prevented accidental (or purposeful, if you didn’t like your sparring partner) injury, plus they were a lot lighter in weight than the actual cutlass; an important consideration when the cutlass drill lasted up to two hours each day.

The drill involved learning both defensive and offensive sequences with the cutlass. According to the 1869 drill manual, the defensive phase of the drill was “le fort” and the offensive phase was “le faible.” Footwork was as important as the wielding of the edged weapon, with the sailor generally advancing aggressively towards his opponent on offense and backing up on defense.

When we are in camp as the USS Ft. Henry at events, we put on demonstrations of single stick drill for the public, which is always a big hit.

Photos from the Library of Congress Civil War Drawings collection (online) and the USS Ft. Henry.

Ship Island-The Unsinkable Tender

2011-09-29T13:40:00.001-04:00

To borrow a modern U.S. Navy term, each of the U.S.N's blockading squadrons needed a "forward deployed" base near the war zone if it had any hopes of keeping ships on their stations for lengthy periods of time. The Gulf Blockading Squadrons' base was Ship Island.

Located about 15 miles south of the mainland of Mississippi, Ship Island had been used for decades before the Civil War as a safe anchorage. The island's value to national security was evident with the construction of Fort Massachusetts in the 1850s (not finished until the end of the war).

The 4th Louisiana occupied the island at the beginning of the war, but it soon became evident that it would difficult for Confederate forces to hold while U.S. Navy ships were the area. Confederate Major-General G.E. Twiggs noted in September 1861 that a squadron of "Two heavy frigates, two steamers, a brig, and two tenders" were bearing down on his garrison. Fearful of being cut off and not waiting for further instructions, he wisely ordered an evacuation.

Union ground forces formally occupied the island a few weeks later. For the rest of the war, Ship Island served as a major repair and resupply base for blockading ships and as a jumping off point for operations all along the Gulf Coast.

New Feature on the CWN 150 Blog: Admiral's Row

2011-09-27T20:25:00.001-04:00


New Admiral's Row Feature Circled in Red.

It is always the goal of any successful business or organization to grow and attract/entice new audiences. Expand or die, right? Well, the CWN 150 isn't seeking any new empires or land unfortunately. What we are doing is trying out a new user-based weekly update, aptly titled "Admiral's Row." This section of the blog (shown above) will post the "best of the best"each week from around the internet. Specifically, this new blog feature encourages CWN 150 subscribers to visit and participate in our TWITTER discussions @Civilwarnavy. Updates will be made weekly. Enjoy!

Farragut Marker: Problem Solved?

2011-09-27T00:44:00.002-04:00

Admiral Farragut Monument, Madison Square, NYC

It was reported HERE at the end of August that the Knoxville area marker of Admiral David G. Farragut's birthplace was missing. According to Jack Neely's report, the marker's owner "had no plans to bother the marker, told us he had not been in touch with the owner lately, and had not heard that the marker was gone."

Six days ago, WATE.COM reported in Hardy Boys-esque fashion that the "Mystery of the Admiral Farragut Marker" was solved. According to the WATE.COM report, "Lylan Fitzgerald, who owns the land where the marker used to sit, said she was tired of the controversy over the stone and the historic property, so she removed it." The article ends on a somber note, with the owner wishing that interested parties would simply "leave her alone," as the marker sits on private property.

Just 19 hours ago, The Tennessean shed more light on the matter. According to today's report, Fitzgerald removed it because of issues she was having with trespassers. Because of this, Fitzgerald gave the removed marker to a historic collector. Although Fitzgerald is pleased with these new developments, other local residents are concerned. According to West Knox County resident Margot Kline stated in The Tennessean that the DAR hopes that the marker is replaced within public view, perhaps within a museum or historic monument in the future. No word on any of these future developments at the moment. You can read the full Tennessean article HERE.

Are the sentiments of Ms. Kline your own? Post your comments here, or tweet your thoughts @civilwarnavy. This is an interesting and haunting development in the cultivation of our collective memory of the Civil War.

Cape Hatteras Expedition

2011-09-21T11:21:00.005-04:00

The bombardment of Fort Clark by Cumberland, Minnesota, and Wabash.

On August 26, 1861, the U.S Navy and Army's expedition to Cape Hatteras cleared Hampton Roads and navaigated south. Commodore Slias Stringham commanded the Navy's portion of the expedition that consisted of the steam frigates USS Wabash and Minnesota, the sail sloop-of-war USS Cumberland, the paddle steamer USS Susquehana, and steam gunboat USS Monticello.

Before leaving Hampton Roads, Stringham had received intelligence about the two forts that guarded the Inlet from recently released merchant ship masters. The Confederate garrison allowed the officers of the ships to roam the forts freely.

The attack began on the morning of August 28. With Wabash towing Cumberland, the two ships approached Fort Clark. From about 1,300 yards from the Confederate fortification, Wabash began the battle with her two pivot guns, both X-inch Dahlgrens, followed by Cumberland and Minnesota’s X-inch Dahlgrens. The rest of the squadron’s smaller guns then engaged. The squadron steamed in a clockwise circle south and then back to the north.

Flag Officer Samuel Barron had earlier travelled down from Portsmouth, Virginia to take charge of forts, called Forts Clark and Hatteras. Using guns captured from Gosport, Barron ordered his garrison to return fire. Finding Clark outgunned, he ordered that the garrison to retreat to Fort Hatteras. After several more hours, Barron believed the situation hopeless and surrendered. Stringham shipped the Confederate commodore and the garrison to prisons in the north.

Strategically, the capture of the two forts shut down privateering for good. It also opened up the North Carolina sounds to further advances. It also came one month after the Union debacle at Bull Run. As a result, the Northern press treated the victory as if the North had just won the war.

Fort Clark after being captured

Even Old News is Good News

2011-09-18T10:36:00.002-04:00

Here is a few interesting events and tidbits on the Civil War navies around the interwebs this past week:

Photo Credit: Kate Taylor

There was a really interesting article from the New Haven, CT Working Waterman. Freelance writer Kate Taylor wrote a fantastic piece on the towns' plans to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. She included this picture of a baby next to her great, great, great, great grandfather Ulmer A. Brown, a New Haven resident who served in the U.S. Navy during the Civil War.

According to New Haven resident Samuel H. Beverage, “My guess is that the larger number [of the island’s Civil War veterans] were in the Navy which outnumbered the South Navy and served more as a Blockade Enforcement than they did in pitched battles.” She also included an interesting quote from Maine-based author Peter Scott. Scott apparently agrees with the previous quote, stating that the “North Haven men survived in such numbers because they were blockading at sea.” Does this detract from the rigorous reality of blockade duty? Or is this merely a mimicked reaction to the public memory of the navies' involvement during the war itself? You can read the full article HERE.

This was a week of conferences. Everything from the annual Naval History Symposium (Annapolis, MD), the Historic Naval Ships Association Conferences (Honolulu, HI), and the American Association of State and Local History (Richmond, VA). If you have any interesting information relevent to the Civil War navies from these events, comment here, on facebook, or tweet them @civilwarnavy. If you haven't already, make sure you are following the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial on Twitter (@civilwarnavy), on Facebook, and LinkedIn. Posts are occasionally included on the Naval History blog as well.

There is also more interesting news. The Naval History and Heritage Command was accepted to create an iTunes U page. Please check back for updates. Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial-related items will be "tagged," as it is an official U.S. Navy commemoration within the command. Keep posted, the podcasting has already begun to formulate! You will need iTunes in order to view and download all content from the iTunes U site.

Historic Dates and Events:

14 September 1861: The USS Colorado sank the Confederate private schooner Judah off Pensacola, Fla.
16 September 1854: This date marks a historic day for the future Admiral David Glasgow Farragut. Although he was a decade away from remarking those famous words at Mobile Bay, the younger CDR took possession of Mare Island in 1854. This was the first U.S. Navy Yard in the Pacific.
17 September 1861: Union landing party from USS Massachusetts takes possession of Ship Island south of New Orleans, LA. This was the headquarters for ADM David Farragut's Gulf Coast Blockading Squadron.

The U.S. Navy's Ironclad Board-Prophecies

2011-09-14T10:12:00.004-04:00

Ironclad board members-Commodore Joseph Smith (chair), Commodore Hiram Paulding,
Captain Charles Davis

Along with making recommendations to Secretary Welles on which ironclad designs the Navy should purchase, the three men of the Navy's Ironclad Board provided some unsolicited opinions on the short term future of naval warfare. Given the age of each of men, one would think each of them would be out of touch with modern warfare. However, their younger counterparts (of both navies) would have been wise to take these men's advice in the coming years.

Smoothbore or Rifled Guns
-"As yet we knowing superior to the large and heavy spherical shot in its destructive effects on vessels, whether plated or not. Rifled guns have greater range, but the conical shot do not produce the crushing effect of spherical shot."

Armor Schemes
-"It is possible a backing of some elastic substance (soft wood, perhaps in the best) might relieve the frame of the ship somewhat from the terrible shock of a heavy projective, though the plate should not be fractured."

Brown Water Navy
-"Our immediate demands seem to require, first, so far as practicable, vessels invulnerable to shot, of light draught of water to penetrate our shoals, rives, and bayous. We therefore favor the construction of this class vessels before going into a more perfect system of large iron-clad sea-going vessels of war."

Ironclads vs. Forts
-"No ship or floating battery, however heavily she may be plated, can cope successfully with a properly constructed fortification of masonry. The one is fixed and immovable and though constructed of material which be shattered by shot, can be covered if need be, by the same or much heavier armor than floating vessels can bear. The other is subject to disturbances by winds and waves, and to the powerful effects of tides and currents. Armored ships or other batteries may be employed advantageously to pass fortifications on land for ulterior objects of attack."

Foreign Warship Purchases
-"We are of the opinion that every people or nation who can maintain a navy should be capable of constructing it themselves."

Don't Forget About Wooden Ships
-"Wooden ships may be said to be but coffins for their crews when brought in conflict with iron-clad vessels; but the speed of the former, we take for granted, being greater than that of the latter, they can readily choose their position and keep out of harm's way."

The U.S. Navy's Ironclad Board-Good Ideas/Bad Ideas

2011-09-13T10:05:00.001-04:00

In August 1861, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles tasked three veteran naval officers, Commodore Joseph Smith, Commodore Hiram Paulding, and Commander Charles H. Davis, to find the U.S. Navy ironclad warships to counter reported Confederate ironclads already under construction. The three men of the “Ironclad Board” turned to the private sector’s ingenuity to provide a solution. With a public advertisement, the board gave American engineers and inventors twenty-five days to submit their ideas. The ideas had to be backed up with construction data and builder’s plans. By the end of September, the Board received sixteen proposals, some more sound than others.

In the end, the Board recommended three ships-John Ericson’s Monitor, Merrick & Sons’ New Ironsides, and C.S.Bushnell’s Galena. Even these three designs, the Board was not entirely pleased with. Ericson’s and Bushnell’s designs were considered unseaworthy and Merrick’s design was possibly too complex for American ironworks to build. The Board deferred judgment on a design from prolific inventor Edward Renwick. The Board liked Renwick’s design, but at $1.5 million, it would have cost the Board’s entire budget to fund.

As for the other twelve, the Board placed those designs in the “not recommended” category and threw them in the trash. Among this group were two monster ships that each displaced about 15,000 tons, were about 325 feet in length, and drew 25 feet of water (the size of a first generation dreadnought-type battleship); one that was far too small as it only displaced 90-tons; one that was outright fraud as the proposed cost seemed too low and the plans were amateurish; two that had defective armor schemes; and one where the engineer proposed building a “rubberclad” with rubber armor instead of iron.

Kitty in the Turret?

2011-09-12T12:37:00.006-04:00

Was there really a black cat stowed away in the turret of the USS Monitor during the Battle of Hampton Roads as legend and crew member Francis Butts have suggested?

Check out NOAA's findings to learn more: The Cat in the Turret 'Comes Back'.

Ft. Pickens and the Pensacola Navy Yard II

2011-09-11T10:35:00.010-04:00

In a prior post (26 August 2011), I introduced you to the events transpiring at the Pensacola Navy Yard (Florida) and Ft. Pickens through the first half of 1861. The summer of 1861 passed quietly, with the Confederates reinforcing their positions on the mainland and Union forces fortifying their garrison at Ft. Pickens, on Santa Rosa Island. Because the Union position effectively sealed off use of the Navy Yard and Pensacola Bay from the adjacent Gulf of Mexico, the seizure of the Navy Yard never really benefitted the Confederacy. In late August, a vessel attempted to put to sea from the Navy Yard, but gunfire from batteries erected on Santa Rosa turned it back.

In early September, a Union raiding party burned a dry dock that had floated loose in the Bay to prevent its recovery and use by the Confederates. About this same time, Flag Officer Mervine of the Gulf Blockading squadron received a report that the Confederates were fitting out the privateer Judah at the Pensacola Yard. During the night of 13-14 September 1861, a raiding force of 100 bluejackets and marines under Lt. John H. Russell set out from the USS Colorado. Somehow the Confederate watch on the Judah had been forewarned and they opened fire on the Union raiders. Undaunted, the sailors and marines swarmed over the gunwales and captured the privateer. Confederate reinforcements arrived on the adjacent dock and an intense fire fight ensued between ship and shore. Russell ordered the spiking of the guns mounted on the privateer, and subsequently set fire to the schooner. The entire affair was over in 15 minutes, and the Union raiders returned to the Colorado with the Judah burning away brightly. The Union force suffered 3 killed and 13 wounded, the Confederates the same number killed and unknown wounded. Historian Ed Bearss has noted that this was the first Florida Civil War battle involving loss of life.

Photo sources: Naval History and Heritage Command and Florida Dept. of State photo archive.

USS Cairo "America the Beautiful®" Coin Unveiling at Vicksburg NMP

2011-09-10T10:43:00.002-04:00

Last tuesday marked an historic day for Vicksburg National Military Park and its celebrated ship, USS Cairo. Amongst a crowd of over 2,500 assembled underneath her bow, the Cairo officially became the newest face of the United States Mint's "America the Beautiful" coin collection. Shown above, the coin depicts the famous ship steaming down the Mississippi where she fought in several critical battles for Union control of the western theater of operations, specifically the Vicksburg campaign .

Nearly 2,000 elementary students from area schools were in attendance, including music provided by the Utica Jubilee Singers of Hinds Community College. Dressed in the dark-blue wool uniform of a Union Navy seaman, fifteen year old Sam Andrews, a park VIP pictured below, read a portion of the diary of George Yost describing the sinking of the USS Cairo. Yost was also fifteen when he served aboard the ship. After the ceremony, everyone under the age of 18 received a new Vicksburg Quarter and keepsake case from the Mint. According to Park Ranger Tim Kavanaugh, the coin unveiling witnessed by so many children gave the event "a youthful exuberance."

Park VIP Sam Andrews reads a portion of the diary of George Yost describing the sinking of the USS. Cairo. NPS Photo

The Cairo, an ironclad river gunboat captained by Thomas Selfridge, was sunk by Confederates in the Yazoo River north of Vicksburg on December 12, 1862. She was raised on December 12, 1964 and is on permanent display, along with all artifacts salvaged, at Vicksburg National Military Park.

Vicksburg Visitors & Convention Bureau

This is a historic event for the 150th commemoration of the Civil War and its navies. The coin is the ninth to be released in the series. Special thanks to Tim Kavanaugh for providing the CWN 150 with this information.

2012 Civil War Navy Conference Announced

2011-09-06T14:35:00.001-04:00

CALL FOR PAPERS
Civil War Navy Conference at the 10th Annual Battle of Hampton Roads Weekend
March 9-11, 2012

Featuring award-winning authors Harold Holzer and Craig Symonds

The Mariners' Museum in Newport News, VA, along with its partners at
NOAA's Monitor National Marine Sanctuary, The Museum of the
Confederacy, and the Hampton Roads Naval Museum are soliciting panels
and poster sessions for the Civil War Navy Conference held during the
10th annual Battle of Hampton Roads Weekend in Newport News, VA, March
9-11, 2012. Papers will be considered in the following areas:

. Civil War Naval
- History
- Technology
- Literature
- Art
- Popular culture

. Civil War Underwater Archaeology and Conservation

Panel proposals should have no more than 3 presenters plus chair.
Sessions will run no more than 90 minutes. Presentations submitted
separately may be placed on panels at the discretion of the hosting
organizations.

Poster sessions should be formatted for 30 minutes: 15 minutes for
presentation and 15 minutes for Q&A.

Proposals (poster: 250 words, panel: 500 words) including a 50-word
bio for each contributor should be sent by 1 November 2011 to
aholloway@MarinersMuseum.org or by mail to:

Battle of Hampton Roads 2012 Symposium
c/o Anna Holloway
The Mariners' Museum
100 Museum Drive
Newport News, VA 23606

Decisions on submissions will be made by 30 December 2011.

Presenters selected will be entitled to a speaker's rate for
registration and will have access to discounted rooms. Presenters are
responsible for their own travel arrangements.

Pre-registration preferred, but walk-ins are welcome. Registration
opens November, 2011.

The Mariners' Museum
100 Museum Drive
Newport News, VA 23606
www.MarinersMuseum.org

SOURCE: H-Net

Civil War at Sea: U.S. Naval Strategy in the Civil War Youtube Video

2011-09-01T10:20:00.002-04:00

Hampton Roads Naval Museum and CWN 150 Staff have been working closely with Bob Rositzke of R.H. Rositske & Associates to create a series of educational videos discussing the role of the navies during the Civil War. We are all pleased to announce the third of five videos, "U.S. Naval Strategy in the Civil War," is now available for viewing on Youtube. The video is sponsored by William Erickson and the Surface Navy Association.

Farragut Birthplace Marker Reported Missing

2011-08-31T19:14:00.003-04:00

The Metroplus, a Knoxville, Tennessee area media outlet reports that a marker sited at Admiral David G. Farragut's birthplace is missing.

(Picture of marker by Margot Kline of Knoxville, Tennessee, courtesy of HMDB.org.)

Jack Neely reports:

At the center of a years-long controversy concerning possible private development of the old Lowes Ferry site, also known as Stoney Point, off Northshore just east of Admiral Farragut Park, is a large stone monument denoting the birthplace of David Glasgow Farragut. It's been there for 111 years, until lately, that is. Sponsored by the Daughters of the American Revolution, the marker was installed in 1900 when a flotilla of riverboats bearing national press and dignitaries, chief among them naval hero Admiral George Dewey, steamed to the site from downtown Knoxville....

Since the 1970s, it's been behind a fence, on formally private property. John Fitzgerald owned it then; after his death a few years ago, his widow and heir Lylan proposed to develop the peninsula without necessarily insuring public access to the birthplace and monument, though local officials had been hopeful about working something out, if only a walking trail from the adjacent county park....

We got word Tuesday that the marker itself is missing. The owner's attorney, who told a reporter last year that the owner had no plans to bother the marker, told us he had not been in touch with the owner lately, and had not heard that the marker was gone.

(Read the full story on the MetroPulse site)

The 1861 "Expedition Hurricane" and Port Royal

2011-08-29T20:52:00.006-04:00

1861 Hurricane Season

As of today the east coast is free of Hurricane Irene's grasp. The CAT 1 storm cut a swath up the East Coast, causing widespread damage from North Carolina to Vermont. We sincerely hope everyone was safe during this past weekend's storm.

Looking through the records, it seems that a similar hurricane to Irene occurred 150 years ago. On the heels of the Port Royal Expedition, Hurricane Eight, better known as the "Expedition Hurricane," severely impacted the timeline for the Union thrust into the vital Confederate stronghold.

According to the National Hurricane Center, the three day storm was the last of the season. "Hurricane Eight" began on the southwestern tip of Florida and climbed up the east coast. Not unlike Irene, the storm made landfall along the Outer Banks of North Carolina as a CAT 1, slowly diminishing speed up the coast before downgrading to a tropical storm by nightfall on 2 November. At its height, the hurricane reached winds approaching 80 mph.

The storm caused many problems for the United States Navy preparing for the expedition to capture the Confederate center along the Port Royal Sound. Although the earliest storm warning occurred in late October while the fleet assembled, the most devastating impact came on the 2nd.

Most of the ships involved in the storm were spared, many having to unload precious cargo to stay afloat. One ship which did not fair well, the transport Governor, lost seven Marines during a fateful rescue by the USS Sabine's crew. Writing to Blockade commander Samuel F. Du Pont, Southern Division Marine Corps Commander JNO. George Reynolds communicated the harrowing wind, waves, and rescue:

"The sea was running so high, and we being tossed so violently, it was deemed prudent to slack up the hawser and let the Governor fall astern of the frigate with the faint hope of weathering the gale till morning. All our provisions and other stores, indeed every movable article, were thrown overboard, and the water casks started to lighten the vessel. From half past 3 until daybreak the Governor floated in comparative safety, notwithstanding the water was rapidly gaining on her. At daybreak preparations were made for sending boats to our relief although the sea was running high, and it being exceedingly dangerous for a boat to approach the guards of the steamer. In consequence the boats laid off and the men were obliged to jump into the sea, amid were then hauled into the boats. All hands were thus providentially rescued from the wreck with the exception, I am pained to say, of 1 corporal and 6 privates, who were drowned or killed by the crush or contact of the vessels. Those drowned were lost through their disobedience of orders in leaving the ranks, or abandoning their posts."

Despite the loss of ship and life, the fleet of 77 ships went on to capture the sound at the Battle of Port Royal. Stay tuned in November for more information on that specific sesquicentennial battle.

Ft. Pickens and the Pensacola Navy Yard

2011-08-26T17:07:00.016-04:00

In all the excitement this spring with the start of the CW Sesquicentnnial, I forgot to post this significant event in Florida’s CW Navy history. The Pensacola Navy Yard was considered by some to be second only to the Norfolk Navy Yard in importance. Confederate forces occupied the Navy Yard and adjacent Fts. Barrancas and McRee in January 1861, shortly after Florida’s secession. Just prior to that occupation, in a move strikingly similar to Anderson’s movement out to Ft. Sumter, US Army Lt. Adam Slemmer moved his small garrison of 57 men to Ft. Pickens, on Santa Rosa Island at the mouth of Pensacola Bay. The garrison was supported by the gunboat USS Wyandotte and the supply ship USS Supply, along with 30 additional seamen in the Fort.

Slemmer steadfastly refused several requests by Confederate officers to surrender the Fort. In early February 1861, additional reinforcements arrived in the form of the sailing frigate USS Sabine, the steam sloop USS Brooklyn, and the sailing sloop USS St. Louis. Over the next several months, both sides worked to fortify their positions. In April additional Union troops were landed to fortify the fort garrison, and the steam sloop USS Powhatan,under the command of Navy Lt. David Dixon Porter, brought in needed supplies. Through most of the summer of 1861, things were quiet in Pensacola, but the situation would change by the fall of that year. More on that to come. Drop me an email if you would like to see sources used for this post. Photo sources are the Naval History and Heritage Command and the Florida Dept. of State on-line photo archive.

USN Squadron supporting Ft. Pickens. Shown are the USS Sabine and the USS Brooklyn (center foreground), to the left the gunboat USS Wyandotte, and in the background the USS Supply and USS Crusader.

Flags Over Hatteras Conference POSTPONED

2011-08-25T09:51:00.000-04:00

Due to the threat of Hurricane Irne, those who were planning on going to the Flags Over Hatteras Sesquicentennial Event and Conference will have to wait a bit longer. It was recently posted on their website that the conference, monument dedication, ole time auction, and living history demonstrations will be postponed due to the inclement weather. Please check back on the Flags Over Hatteras website or here on the CWN 150 Blog for more scheduling information. Stay safe this weekend!

- CWN 150

Confederate Ironclads on the Mississippi

2011-08-24T19:52:00.004-04:00

Just as their Northern counterparts, Confederate naval authorities looked first to the sea. Fortifying essential ports, and converting merchantmen were the primary problems for Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen R. Mallory. But by June 1861, Tennessee had passed a resolution calling on Richmond to fund a large-scale building program in the west, and Kentuckians could look across the Ohio River and see the Union’s Timberclads steaming unmolested, with more warships being constructed. The states of the upper south already knew what the U.S. Army and Navy had in store for the Mississippi.

In August 1861, Memphis shipbuilder John T. Shirley offered Secretary Mallory an opportunity to construct the Confederacy’s first ironclads on western waters. Already aware of demand for a naval presence, Mallory consulted with officers and naval architects in order to understand his options and resolved to fully back an ironclad building program. On 23 August, Confederate Tennessee Congressman David M. Currin submitted legislation to allocate funds for the creation of an inland navy, including $160,000 for the construction of two ironclads. The bill appropriated more funds for the naval defense of New Orleans, and Mallory would use these additional allocations to finance the construction of the additional ironclads Mississippi and Louisiana. On 24 August, the bill was passed and Jefferson Davis signed the act into law. The Confederate naval buildup in the west would now unfold.

"Farragut's Ball" Song Lyrics

2011-08-23T10:34:00.000-04:00

Although we are a little over three years away from the 150th Anniversary of the Battle of Mobile Bay, it is always a good time to introduce readers to interesting vignettes into the collective memory of the Civil War navies.

Johnson & Co . Song Publishers. Image courtesy of Duke University Libaries.

This is an image of original sheet music for "Farragut's Ball," a song parodying the classic Irish bar tune "Lanagan's Ball." Recently, the song was reproduced and recorded by the folks at the Smithsonian Insitution (Smithsonian Folkways) for their "Civil War Naval Songs" album. You can read the typed lyrics to this song at Duke University Libaries, or read the original lyrics to "Lanigan's Ball" HERE.

A Most Unlikely Naval Base: Mound City, Illinois

2011-08-22T22:44:00.014-04:00

Before the Civil War, Mound City, IL was an unremarkable port town on the Ohio River. It certainly benefited from river traffic, but never became a major hub of commerce. Speculators had even built several warehouses in anticipation of the town's growth, only to remain empty at the war's outset. Mound City eventually grew, but never in the way investors imagined.

James Eads ushered Mound City into the spotlight when he began building new warships there in the summer of 1861. New building contracts kept rolling in from the Army, and quickly Mound City was transformed into one of the west's most important military centers.

The Marine Ways allowed steamboats to be hauled entirely out of the Ohio River so that carpenters could repair and improve them for wartime duty. In late 1861, a new military hospital (pictured behind the U.S.S. Daisy) was constructed and staffed by army surgeons, volunteers, and South Bend, Indiana's Nursing Sisters of the Holy Cross. With the large hospital came the creation of the Mound City National Cemetery.

1862 saw a new foundry built, and the town was connected to the Illinois Central Railroad. Mound City was now a center for troop transportation as soldiers disembarked by train only to re-embark on steamers headed for the Deep South.

By 1863, the Navy stored all ordnance for the Mississippi Squadron here and a detachment of Marines was entrusted with its protection. Through 1864, the Navy transformed Mound City into its headquarters for all western operations, a distinction the town kept until the close of the war. From 1863-65, if a western warship needed repairing or construction, Mound City was the place to do it.

Civil War at Sea: Technology in the Civil War (Video 2 of 5) Now Available

2011-08-22T12:58:00.001-04:00

Hampton Roads Naval Museum and CWN 150 Staff have been working closely with Bob Rositzke of R.H. Rositske & Associates to create a series of educational videos discussing the role of the navies during the Civil War. We are all pleased to announce the second of five videos, "Technology in the Civil War," is now available for viewing on Youtube. The video is sponsored by William Erickson and the Surface Navy Association.

You can go to Bob Rositzke's Youtube page HERE to view all of his videos. Stay tuned in the upcoming weeks for more videos (Part 3 of 5: Strategy)! Please leave your comments below!

The Mosquito Fleets

2011-08-19T17:14:00.008-04:00

As the war progressed, the Confederate Navy along the S. Atlantic coast began to take shape using a variety of converted merchant steamers, tugs, schooners and sloops. Often the ships were taken in “as is” condition and one or two pieces of field artillery were mounted on the deck. Bales of cotton stacked on the decks may have been used to provide some protection from small arms fire (hence the name “cottonclad”). These small, makeshift flotillas were dubbed “Mosquito Fleets”, which made up in courage and gumption what they lacked in size and firepower. In October 1861, Capt. William Lynch of the CS Navy, in command of 5 small gunboats, captured a Union tug and landed a small force of Confederate soldiers in an attempt to drive Union forces off Roanoke Island, NC. Lynch later led a force of 8 gunboats against a larger Union expedition in the area in February 1862 (interesting note: one of those CSN gunboats was commanded by Lt. Charles Simms, whom Sarah mentioned in her post “Where were they then?”). In November 1861, a mosquito fleet under the command of Commodore Josiah Tattnall contested DuPont’s assault against Port Royal, SC. Tattnall also led small groups of gunboats in actions against the US Navy along the Georgia Coast, particularly the Savannah River. Note “Tattnall’s Fleet” in the right center background of the illustration. Drop me an email if you would like references/sources for this post.

The Hatteras Expedition Assembles

2011-08-18T10:16:00.002-04:00

Cape Hatteras and the North Carolina Sounds had become a perfect safe haven for Confederate commerce raiders. As Northern merchant ships used the Gulf Stream as expressway home from West Indies ports, the local waters were target rich. Several dozen small merchants fell victim to privateers and small commissioned gunboats.

To put a stop to this, the Union's Blockade Board recommended using filling schooners with stones and sinking them Hatteras' channel. After consultations with local pilots about the currents in the area, the idea was soon rejected. Commodore Silas Stringham recommended seizing the Hatteras Inlet as the only real solution.

In mid-August, the expedition began to assemble in Hampton Roads. The large steam frigates USS Minnesota and Wabash and the all sail sloop-of-war USS Cumberland formed the core of a task force of several warships and transports. The expedition's assembly caused a buzz in Northern newspapers who were looking for something positive to write about in light of the humiliating sting of Bull Run.

CSS Virginia LEGO Model Finished

2011-08-12T00:29:00.001-04:00

If you saw last week's post on an amazing LEGO Monitor ship built by some HRNM Summer Intern Samuel Nelson, we are happy to inform you that both Sam and fellow intern Jordan Hock have recently completed the famed counterpart to the Union ironclad. CSS Virginia. Here is a picture of the completed CSS Virginia positioned as she was during the Battle of Hampton Roads.

As a special "Civil War Navy" section to the upcoming STEM-based program at HRNM (Brick-by-Brick: The LEGO Shipbuilding Program), we will offer step-by-step designs for all you LEGO enthusiasts out there in upcoming weeks. Stay tuned!

CSS Sumter Makes a Break For It

2011-08-10T11:08:00.001-04:00

CSS Sumter in New Orleans

It was realized early on by Confederate Secretary of the Navy Stephen Mallory that he would have to have actual commissioned warships on the high seas if the Confederate guerre d'course was going to suceed. Among the first of these Confederate cruisers was CSS Sumter under the command of Raphel Semmes. Here is Semmes' account of the cruiser's dramatic breakout out from the Head of Passes and into the Gulf of Mexico on June 30, 1861.

Finally, on Sunday morning, the 30th of June, it having been reported to me that the Brooklyn was absent from her station, I caused steam to be gotten up, got underway, and ran down toward the Pass. As we approached the mouth of the river we discovered the Brooklyn with our glasses, standing back under steam and sail to regain her station, and it was for some time a little doubtful whether we could pass the bar before she came up.

To add to my perplexity, the pilot protested that he knew only the bar of the Southwest Pass, and could not undertake to run me out of Pass a l’Outre [the eastern branch of the Mississippi River delta]. I continued on, however, hoisting a signal for a pilot at the fore.

As luck would have it, a pilot happened to be present at the pilots’ station a little above the light house, and as we ran by it the gallant fellow pushed aboard in his boat, and in fifteen minutes afterwards he had us outside the bar. We discharged him in great haste and all sail and steam, the Brooklyn being in pursuit about 4 miles distant. The next few hours were of course very anxious ones for me, as the Brooklyn had the reputation of great speed, and our relative powers were to be tested.

By 3:30, Commander Poor gave up the chase. As he bore up, I sent my men into the rigging, and we gave three hearty cheers for the flag of the Confederate States, thus for the first time thrown to the breeze on the high seas by a ship of war.

The Privateering Begins !!

2011-08-07T16:20:00.008-04:00

On 17 April 1861 (two days prior to Lincoln’s declaration of a blockade), CSA President Jefferson Davis issued a proclamation authorizing privateering against Union commercial shipping by southern vessel owners (see post by Gordon on 14 April 2011). This authorization was subsequently ratified by the Confederate Congress. Privateering was often the strategy used by an inferior navy against a superior one; and this was in fact the strategy used by the US Navy against the British in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. The Confederate privateers were thus the first naval blow of the Civil War struck against the Union.

Just over a week after Davis’ proclamation, a sidewheel steam towboat emerged from the mouth of the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico as the CS Privateer Calhoun. Commanded by Capt. John Wilson, possessing a Letter of Marque and Reprisal from the CSA government, over the next two weeks this ship captured six Union merchant vessels; three cargo vessels (the bark Ocean Eagle, the freighter Milan, and the schooner Ella) and three whalers (the schooners John Adams and Mermaid and the brig Panama). The Calhoun’s exploits were ended by the arrival of the steam sloop USS Brooklyn off the Mississippi in late May (post by yours truly on 12 June 2011). The prizes captured by the Calhoun were adjudicated in the CS District Court for Louisiana, in New Orleans, for a total of $26,650, which was distributed to the owners, officers and crew of the privateer. As the war progressed, this type of profit became less expected, due to the difficulty of getting prizes back through the blockade, the eventual financial poverty of the Confederacy, and the refusal of European powers to allow prizes to be adjudicated in their courts. The Calhoun was eventually captured by the US Navy blockade in January 1862 and converted into a US gunboat under the same name.

Over on the Atlantic Coast, an active area of privateering developed off the North Carolina coast in the Hatteras Inlet area during July-August 1861. Ships of the NC Navy (the NCS Winslow, Raleigh, and Beaufort) and the “true” privateer CS Gordon would hide in the shallow bays and sounds behind the barrier islands and strike out of the inlet, capturing a number of Union merchant ships. This appears to be one of the factors driving the Union raid against the Inlet in August of 1861 (more to come on that in a couple weeks).

Finally, off the South Carolina coast, a fast sailing brig was converted into the privateer CS Jefferson Davis. Under the command of Capt. Louis M. Coxetter (a former US Navy officer), she terrorized Union shipping. Armed with five ancient English guns, and a crew of 75 well armed with small arms and cutlasses, she captured prize after prize, sending them back to Charleston for adjudication. The “Jeff Davis” ended her career wrecked off St. Augustine after a gale; recent underwater archaeological work in the area appears to have found her remains, and they are currently being explored and recovered. Coxetter earned a reputation for treating the officers and crews of the captured vessels in an exceptionally decent manner, and went on to earn greater glory in the CW as a captain of blockade runners.

NOTE ON SOURCES – I have found that a good source for information on the Confederate Navy is the series of books written by R. Thomas Campbell. Some of these are edited works presenting accounts by CS Navy personalities, others are original compilations discussing the privateers, the Confederate fleets, the commerce raiders, the ironclads, etc. You can find his books at his web site: http://www.confederatenavalhistory.com/.

SOURCES

Campbell, R. Thomas. Fire & Thunder. Exploits of the Confederate States Navy. Shippensburg: Burd Street Press, 1997.

Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships: http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/index.html

Fowler, William M., Jr. Under Two Flags. The American Navy in the Civil War. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1990.

Simson, Jay W. Naval Strategies of the Civil War. Nashville: Cumberland House, 2001.

Pictoral Envelopes-Early Confidence in the U.S. Navy

2011-08-02T15:51:00.001-04:00

Early in the war, the general public in the Northern and Southern states believed that the war would be quick, easy, and painless. One such example of this early confidence can found in pictorial envelopes. These images were produced by New York City print shops and often contain some type of cartoon image expressing patriotism or political opinion. The U.S. Navy and the print shops' confidence in the the U.S. Navy was a popular subject. All of these images belong to the New York Historical Society. Many more of them and other rare Civil War images and drawings can be found at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpcoop/nhihtml/cwnyhshome.html.

LEGO USS Monitor Model at HRNM

2011-07-30T11:04:00.000-04:00

As many of you know, the headquarters for the Civil War Navy Sesquicentennial is at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum. As an educator at the museum itself, one of the tasks assigned to our staff is to hire summertime interns who work in coordination with the education department. This summer, we seemed to have struck paydirt. Our two HRNM interns, Samuel Nelson and Jordan Hock, have done a phenemonal job this summer with the creation and execution of various programs, including the debut of the first CWN 150 program Blockade: The Anaconda Plan (Available Soon).

One of the things they have taken up recently is kick-starting a new program here at HRNM, Brick by Brick: LEGO Shipbuilding. How does this relate to the CWN 150? One of the models that will be available to build for this program is the USS Monitor created by intern Samuel Nelson (shown here).

You can read the full blog post on the shipbuilding program on the HRNM Blog HERE.

July 28, 1861-An Elephant Squashing a Gnat-USS St. Lawrence v. Privateer Petrel

2011-07-29T16:24:00.001-04:00

On July 28, 1861, the two-gun privateer Petrel (ex-USRS William Aiken) deployed out of Charleston, South Carolina on its maiden voyage. Backed by a group of Charleston businessmen, the ship had been purchased from the South Carolina government in a disposal auction.

A few hours into the deployment, Petrel's company spotted what it thought was its first catch. It was a large ship, according to the watches, specifically it looked like a large East Indiaman-type merchant ship. As the two ships closed range, watches on Petrel realized they had made a horrible mistake. The ship was not a merchant, but rather a U.S. Navy frigate.

Petrel's captain turned the ship about and attempted to escape. The company then made a second mistake, they fired at the frigate and put a shot through one of the frigate's sails. This only succeeded making the frigate angry. The frigate returned fire several times with her forecastle gun, an 8-inch shell gun.

The warship was the sail frigate USS St. Lawrence. Displacing 1,726 tons and carrying over fifty guns (vs. Petrel's 86-tons and two guns), the engagement is one of the greatest mismatches in world naval history (possibly only matched by the battleship HMS Dreadnought ramming the submarine U-29 in 1915). At least one shell from St. Lawrence struck Petrel and exploded. Small boats from St. Lawrence were deployed and rescued thirty-six of the thirty-eight man company (two drowned).

The victory was over-hyped in Northern press as an example of how easy the war at sea was going to be for Federal forces. The New York Times, for example, ran the headline "The Perils of Privateering." Petrel's company was taken to Philadelphia for adjudication on board USS Flag.

The Steam Screw Frigates

2011-07-23T17:14:00.009-04:00

When it comes to the Civil War Navies (really, any Navy), no doubt one of the main “stars of the show” are the ships. Over the past year, we of the CWN150 have enjoyed introducing you to some of the ships of the US Navy in the Civil War, including the “Timberclads” (posts by Craig on 22 Sept 2010 and Caleb on 16 June 2011), the “90-day gunboats” (post by Gordon on 12 July 2011), and the “fighting ferryboats” (post by yours truly on 14 Oct 2010). In time, we will also present overviews of the ships of the Confederate Navy.

The largest class of warships in the US Navy in the war were the “Merrimack” class steam screw frigates. These warships were propelled by a combination of sail (square-rigged) and steam power and were the first US Navy ships to be driven by a “screw” (a propeller on a shaft projecting through the stern). They displaced 3,000+ to 4,000+ tons and ranged in length from 256’10.5” to 264’8.5”. The US Congress authorized construction of these in 1954. All were completed and commissioned before the war began. In keeping with the ship building philosophy of the US Navy (as with the Constitution-class of sailing frigates), these ships were to be larger and heavier-armed than similar ships in their class and be fast enough to outrun anything larger. The USS Merrimack, Wabash, Roanoke, and Colorado were
all named for US rivers; the Minnesota was named for the territory at the time (not yet a state). All were armed with 24 to 28 IX inch Dahlgren smoothbore shell guns on the main gun deck. These were supplemented with 8-inch shell guns in broadside and a 10-inch gun (typically mounted forward) on the spar deck.

At the time they were built, these were among the most formidable warships in the world, although they were somewhat slow (generally not able to exceed 8 knots under steam), and their deep draft proved to be a considerable handicap in the shallow inshore waters and bays of the southeastern US and Gulf coasts during the war. The Wabash saw service in the South Atlantic blockading squadron, serving as DuPont’s and Dahlgren’s flagship. The Merrimack was burned at the start of the war in the Washington Navy Yard and as we know, was resurrected as the ironclad CSS Virginia. The Minnesota was the flagship of Flag Officer Stringham in the Atlantic blockading squadron, and remained Goldsborough’s flagship when he took command of the North Atlantic blockading squadron. Both Minnesota and Roanoke were present at Hampton Roads during that first clash of the ironclads; the Minnesota was driven aground by the Virginia, which would have returned the next day to destroy her if not for the defense by USS Monitor.
The Roanoke was present offshore of Hampton Roads that day and could not enter the harbor because of her draft, although even if she did, she couldn’t have done anything to help her sister ship against the Virginia. The USS Colorado began her war service in the Gulf blockading squadron, serving off the Mississippi River and Mobile Bay; she ended the war in the North Atlantic squadron and was a participant in the assault on Fort Fisher.

A sixth ship in this class was the USS Niagra (named after Fort Niagra, captured from the British by American forces in the War of 1812). Designed by George Steers, he envisioned a warship with the lines and speed of a clipper ship and an armament comparable to the other frigates in her class. To accomplish this, he had to make her immense, displacing in excess of 5,000 tons and over 300’ in length. Despite her size, she did turn out to be a very fast ship, making 10-11 knots under steam and up to16 knots when under sail power. Initially she was armed only with weapons on her spar deck; XI inch Dahlgren guns on pivots. In the middle of the war she was refitted with twenty XI inch Dahlgrens in broadside on her main gun deck, along with the spar deck armament, but the weight of this gunnery made her main deck gunports dangerously low along the waterline and the main deck broadside guns were removed. She was a participant in two historic events prior to the war: helping to lay the first transatlantic cable and transporting the first Japanese delegation to the US back home to Japan. In the Civil War, she saw service in both Atlantic and Gulf squadrons and in the latter half of the war was deployed overseas keeping tabs on Confederate warships being constructed in European shipyards.

RESOURCES

Canney, Donald L. Lincoln’s Navy. The Ships, Men and Organization, 1861-65. London: Conway Maritime Press, 1998.

Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships: http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/index.html

Civil War at Sea: Leadership in the Civil War Video Available on Youtube

2011-07-21T16:15:00.001-04:00

Hampton Roads Naval Museum and CWN 150 Staff have been working closely with Bob Rositzke of R.H. Rositske & Associates to create a series of educational videos discussing the role of the navies during the Civil War. We are all pleased to announce the first of five videos, "Leaders in the Civil War," is now available for viewing on Youtube. The video is sponsored by William Erickson and the Surface Navy Association.

You can go to Bob Rositzke's Youtube page HERE to view all of his videos. Stay tuned in the upcoming weeks for more videos! Please leave comments!