CSS Virginia LEGO Model Finished

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

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 !!

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

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.