THE LOSS OF PETREL

To bolster Union naval forces patrolling the Mississippi in the Civil War, our Navy purchased a total of 63 existing sternwheel and sidewheel riverboats.  Protection was added to their upper works in the form of thick wooden bulwarks overlain with a metal skin.  They mounted heavy guns on the first deck and lighter howitzers on the upper decks.  “Tinclads” as they came to be known exercised patrol, reconnaissance, and gunboat missions along the Mississippi.  One such “tinclad,” USS PETREL, the former riverboat Duchess, operated from February to April 1864 in the Yazoo River of Mississippi.  On April 21^st, 1864, PETREL and her sister tinclad PAIRIE BIRD started upriver escorting the Army transport Freestone.  They were to retake Yazoo City, which had been abandoned by Union troops in February.  PETREL ranged ahead and came abreast of Yazoo City well in advance of the others.  Here she engaged a group of rebels firing from the hills.  As the river was insufficiently wide to turn, Acting Master Thomas McElroy ran upriver past the battery.  The following morning found PETREL against the bank with her crew ashore, collecting rails to stack against the boilers.

Suddenly the gunboat came under fire from a force of enemy infantry with two 12-pounder Parrott rifles.  “Minnie” balls and shot screamed through the air, some piercing completely through PETREL.  McElroy beat his crew to quarters, but found that the position of his boat against the bank prevented his heavy guns from being brought to bear.  The Yankees defended with muskets while McElroy attempted to back down into the stream.  But an enemy shot cut the tinclad’s steam lines; followed by another that struck the magazine and cut off the legs of Gunner’s Mate Charles Seitz.  Enemy sharpshooters began picking off the Union crewmen through the gun ports.  Several of the officers “behaved badly,” falling back out of fear.  Disabled and unable to counter-fire, McElroy decided to burn his vessel.  But just as Asst. Engineer Arthur M. Phillips was setting the gunboat ablaze, another rebel shot raked the stern and burst the boilers, bathing the ship in steam.  The steam doused the fires, and many of McElroy’s officers and crew jumped ashore and ran.  Only the pilot, Kimball Ware, and an enlisted sailor, Quartermaster John H. Nibbe, stayed to assist McElroy in defending PETREL’s flag.  Nibbe helped get the wounded ashore, then all three re-fired the gunboat by spreading coals from the boiler across the deck.

The Confederates surrounded and captured the three brave sailors.  The fires were again extinguished long enough for the rebels to strip every gun and salvageable store.  PETREL was then burned to prevent her re-capture.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  29 APR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, p. IV-46.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 5 “N-Q”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1979, p. 276.

McElroy, Thomas.  Report of loss of Petrel.  IN: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion. Series I-Volume 26:  Naval Forces on Western Waters (March 1, 1864-December 21, 1864).  Washington, DC: GPO, 1914, pp. 248-49.

Porter, David D.  The Naval History of the Civil War.  Mineola, NY: Dover Pub., 1886, pp. 560-61.

Silverstone, Paul H.  Warships of the Civil War Navies.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1989, pp. 165, 176.

United States Congress.  United States of America’s Congressional Medal of Honor Recipients and their Official Citations.  Columbia Heights, MN: Highland House II, 1994, p. 859.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  PETREL was taken with her flag still flying.  Quartermaster John H. Nibbe was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions this day (officers were not eligible at the time).  RADM David Dixon Porter berated PETREL’s remaining officers and crew for their apparent cowardice.

Union “tinclads” also had an enclosed pilothouse constructed on the upper-most deck.  This feature easily identifies such craft in period photographs that survive today.  Our modern system of hull numbering was not adopted until the 1920s, however each of the 63 tinclads had a number painted boldly on the outside of her pilot house.  PETREL was tinclad number 5, and PRAIRIE BIRD was number 11.

The rank of “Master” has an interesting history as well.  Early in the 1800s our Navy had four commissioned officer ranks–Sailing Master, Lieutenant, Master Commandant and Captain.  The Master Commandant rank was changed to “Commander” in 1837, the same year the lowest rank was shortened simply to “Master.”  During the Civil War, to accommodate an expanded force structure, on 16 July 1862 the new ranks of RADM and Commodore were created as Flag ranks above Captain; LCDR was inserted below Commander; and Ensign was inserted below Master.  In 1883 “Masters” became “Lieutenants Junior Grade,” which they remain today!

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                               EASTPORT BEFORE FORT DE RUSSY

The year 1863 had seen a turn in the Civil War in favor of the Union.  A Confederate foray into the north had been reversed at Gettysburg and the last Rebel stronghold on the Mississippi River at Vicksburg had fallen.  With the Mississippi now in Union hands attention turned to Confederate activities west of the river in Louisiana and Arkansas.  Here the Red River provided the main thoroughfare for cotton and other supplies shipping eastward.  As the spring rains swelled the Red River in 1864, combined Union Naval and ground forces planned an assault.

Their first obstacle was Fort de Russy, named for its builder, Confederate Army engineer COL Lewis G. de Russy.  This fort lay 45 miles up the river from the mouth at the Mississippi, a course over which the Red River forms a northward-projecting loop into northeastern Louisiana.  Fort de Russy lay on the western leg of that loop.  Union troops under BGENs Andrew Jackson Smith and Joseph Mower would land on the eastern leg of the loop at Simmesport and march the 28 miles across the bottom of the loop along what is modern Louisiana State Route 1.  They would envelope the rear of the fort while the ironclad warships of RADM David Dixon Porter would proceed up the Red River to support the assault.  On the morning of March 13^th Porter’s transports began disembarking 10,000 Union troops at Simmesport while the ironclad USS EASTPORT under LCDR Seth L. Phelps, along with NEOSHO, LAFAYETTE, CHOCTAW, OSAGE, OZARK, FORT HINDMAN and CRICKET were sent upriver.  Ahead of the main gunboat force, they were to remove obstructions eight miles below the fort.  Their progress was slowed by LAFAYETTE and CHOCTAW, whose long keels plagued negotiation of the channel.

The obstructions proved formidable.  Arriving on this day Phelps found a row of pilings driven into the river bottom across the channel, braced against a second tier of shorter pilings.  Ties and iron plates bridged each piling creating an impassable, anchored “wall.”  Sunken logs blocked access to the downstream side, and from above, trees had been cut and floated down the river to jam up the pilings.  Phelps’ sailors attached tow lines to the pilings, axes swung, and several of the gunboats repeatedly rammed the obstruction.  For several hours they labored, finally breaking a passage open around 1600.  OSAGE, FORT HINDMAN and CRICKET followed EASTPORT the final miles to Fort de Russy.  Here they found Union troops already engaged.

The battle proved one-sided.  The Confederate defender, MGEN John G. Walker, had marched 5000 rebels out to stall the advancing Federals, and most of these escaped to fight another day.  The 300 garrisoned in the fort surrendered after only a brief engagement.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  19 MAR 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, pp. IV-31-32.

Porter, David D.  The Naval History of the Civil War.  Mineola, NY: Dover Pub., 1886, pp. 495-97.

“Report of Rear-Admiral Porter, U.S. Navy, regarding combined movement up the river and capture of Fort de Russy by forces under Brigadier-General Smith, U.S. Army, March 14, 1864.”  IN: Stewart, Charles W.  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 26, Naval Forces on Western Waters from March 1 to December 31, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1914, pp. 24-27.

“Report of Rear-Admiral Porter, U.S. Navy, transmitting report of Lieutenant Commander Phelps, U.S. Navy, regarding removal of obstructions and capture of Fort De Russy.”  IN: Stewart, Charles W.  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 26, Naval Forces on Western Waters from March 1 to December 31, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1914, pp. 29-31.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Among the guns captured at Fort de Russy were three Naval guns, two 9-inch Dahlgren smoothbores formerly in service on USS NDIANOLA and USS HARRIET LANE (both lost earlier in the war) and a 32-pounder cast in the 1820s.

EASTPORT was originally a rebel ironclad, started by the Confederates in the upper Tennessee River in 1862, but captured on the ways by Union forces.

John George Walker, above, was a seasoned and able combat commander.  He had served with the US Army before the Civil War in the Mexican and Apache Wars.  During the Rebellion he saw action in the Peninsular Campaign, at Antietam, and at Vicksburg before commanding in the Trans-Mississippi.  He fled to Mexico after the war but eventually returned to the United States, serving as consul to Bogota in the post-war years.  His narrative history of the Confederacy west of the Mississippi is still in print today.

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                                           “THE SAND PEBBLES”

Factional turmoil in 1920s China surrounding the emergence of the Nationalist Chinese movement led multiple western nations to protect their citizens and commercial shipping on China’s rivers with naval forces.  Richard McKenna’s novel The Sand Pebbles, as well as the 1966 Academy Award nominated film, depicts the trials of an enlisted sailor aboard a US Navy Yangtze River gunboat during this civil unrest.  Though McKenna’s story is fictional, his gunboat, “San Pablo,” is modeled after our contemporary Guam-class Yangtze gunboats.  McKenna’s plot draws from the exploits of a real gunboat, USS VILLALOBOS (PG-42).

VILLALOBOS entered the US Navy in the Philippines.  The former Spanish Navy steam-powered screw sloop was captured in the Spanish-American War and commissioned into our Navy on this date.  Her retained Spanish Navy name remembers the explorer Ruy Lopez de Villalobos, who in the 1540s, charted and named the Philippine Islands for King Philip II.  She patrolled that territory for several years before being transferred to China Station.  There, in June of 1903, under orders from Asiatic Fleet commander RADM Robley D. Evans, VILLALOBOS cruised up the Kan River, a tributary to the Yangtze, to check on the status of American traders and missionaries in Nanchang.  Low river levels blocked her passage to Nanchang, and VILLALOBOS sent a whaleboat ahead.  Having learned that all was well, the gunboat returned to Hankow, unaware that her mission had stirred international turmoil.  Local Chinese authorities protested her visit as overstepping treaty provisions.  RADM Evans countered with the bold statement that, “Our gunboats will continue to navigate…inland waters of China, wherever Americans may be,” and further stated that “severe and lasting” punishment would be dealt to anyone not showing “proper respect” to American citizens.  The American minister in Peking chastised Evans’ statement, but Secretary of State John Hay overruled, endorsing the Asiatic Fleet commander as “proper and correct.”  (In fact, VILLALOBOS’ foray into shallow waters had unknowingly violated a treaty between England and China, though the US was not a signatory to that treaty).

By 1926, VILLALOBOS was a tired and rusting venerable.  Yet with the emergence of the Nationalist Chinese movement VILLALOBOS was sent upriver to Changsha, again to protect American interests.  Low river levels stranded her in Changsha over the Winter of 1926-27 while Nationalist attacks began focusing on foreign “intruders.”  When Spring brought rioting to Hankow VILLALOBOS’ guns oversaw the evacuation of Americans, under orders to “…return and silence fire with suitable battery.”  Elements of these incidents were woven by McKenna into the plot for his novel.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  26 FEB 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Cole, Bernard D.  “The Real Sand Pebbles.” Naval History, Vol 14 (1), February 2000, pp. 16-23.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 7 “T-V”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1981, pp. 521-24.

McKenna, Richard.  The Sand Pebbles.  New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1962.

Tolley, Kemp.  Yangtze Patrol: The U.S. Navy in China.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1984, pp. 58, 125-30, 220.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  McKenna himself was a 22-year Navy veteran with pre-WWII service on China Station.  He retired in 1953 as a Chief Machinist’s Mate

Even in Spanish Navy service VILLALOBOS was under-powered and under-gunned and drafted deeply enough to complicate the patrol of inland waterways.  In 1928, after 33 years of service in two navies, VILLALOBOS was decommissioned, towed out to sea, and expended for target practice.  By then the need for purpose-built gunboats for Yangtze operations had been addressed with the development of the six Guam-class river patrol boats.  Several of these including GUAM (PG-43), PANAY (PG-45), LUZON (PG-47) and MINDANAO (PG-48) would earn fame at the opening of World War II.  Unlike McKenna’s depiction of “San Pablo” these gunboats were diesel powered.

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                                          THE LOSS OF MONITOR

Our Navy first entertained the new technology of armor plating in 1842 when Congress authorized inventor Robert L. Stevens to construct an ironclad steamship for coastal defense.  However, delays in construction, funding, and the death of Mr. Stevens squelched the project.  It was left to the Europeans to develop the first workable ironclads.  During the Crimean War, in 1855, the French deployed three iron-plated floating batteries, LAVE, TONNANT, and DEVASTATION.  Standing only 800 yards off Russian Fort Kilburn, these batteries impressively withstood over 200 hits while reducing the fort to rubble.  The French launched GLOIRE in 1860, a wooden steamer plated over with iron.  Shortly the English followed with WARRIOR, an armored, iron-hulled steamer.

In response to rumors of Confederate plans in 1861, the Union Navy seriously revisited the ironclad concept.  Indeed, John Ericsson’s MONITOR’s successful operational debut against CSS VIRGINIA in Hampton Roads in March 1862 engendered a Navy-wide obsession with these craft.  Inflated perceptions of MONITOR’s invincibility led to calls for her use in recapturing Charleston, the symbolic birthplace of the Rebellion.  Accordingly, in December 1862, MONITOR was ordered from Hampton Roads to Beaufort, SC, the embarkation point for the planned assault on Charleston.  Had the skipper of the side-wheeler USS RHODE ISLAND had the benefit of weather forecasts, he might not have taken MONITOR under tow that December day.  Top heavy, with minimal freeboard, MONITOR was clearly built only for calmer inshore waters.

By the evening of December 29^th, mounting seas off Cape Hatteras began overwashing MONITOR’s deck.  Oakum packing around the turret loosened.  Conditions worsened through the next day.  By the evening of the 30^th, MONITOR was crashing through heavy seas that admitted water down her blower pipes.  And with each broach, more seams loosened.  Her bilge pumps strained.  Unable to find a good riding position, skipper J. L. Bankhead in MONITOR began to fear capsizing.  At 2230 he ordered her abandoned.

Careful to stay clear of MONITOR’s pitching, iron-plated hull, RHODE ISLAND lowered two boats.  But halfway through the rescue MONITOR lost all power and fell into the trough.  Bankhead loosed the anchor, which brought the craft to a more stable position into the seas.  In spite of this some of the remaining sailors, fearful of being washed off the deck, refused all pleadings to leave.  After midnight Bankhead, himself, departed only minutes before MONITOR disappeared, taking sixteen with her.

She remained lost until 1973 when scientists on the research ship Eastward located MONITOR’s 111 year grave off Cape Hatteras.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  4 JAM 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Davis, William C.  Duel Between the First Ironclads.  Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1975, pp. 156-64, 169-70.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 4 “L-M”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1969, p. 415.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 6 “R-S”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1976, p. 91.

Fowler, William M., Jr.  Under Two Flags: The American Navy in the Civil War.  New York, NY: Avon Books, 1990, pp. 92-93.

Keeler, William F. and Robert W. Daly.  Aboard the USS MONITOR: 1862.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1964, pp. 252-60.

Lyons, Justin.  “Raising the Turret.”  Naval History, Vol 16 (6), December 2002, pp. 20-26.

Stick, David.  Graveyard of the Atlantic:  Shipwrecks of the North Carolina Coast.  Chapel Hill, NC: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1952, pp. 52-57.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Years on the sea floor (and pilfering by sport divers) deteriorated the wreck of MONITOR substantially over the decades since its discovery, inspiring a joint effort by NOAA, the Newport News Mariner’s Museum and the US Navy’s Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit 2 to salvage the historic wreck.  In 5 August 2002 the MONITOR Expedition 2002 succeeded in raising significant portions of the wreck, notably MONITOR’s revolving turret.  It is currently preserved at the Mariner’s Museum above.

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                        CYANE AT GUYAMAS

On this afternoon of the Mexican War, CDR Samuel F. Du Pont brought the 20-gun sloop USS Cyane into the seaside harbor of Guyamas on the Sonoran mainland of western Mexico.  His and other US Navy ships patrolled these villages enforcing a blockade of Mexico, indeed, the Sonoran region and California Sur (modern Baja) were primary targets of that blockade.  Only five vessels lay in the harbor, a Peruvian and an Ecuadorian neutrals, and three Mexican-flagged ships–the commercial brig Condor, and two former gunboats, Anahuac and Sonorense, both aground in stages of disassembly.  Du Pont was surprised to discover 500 militia troops ashore, armed with half-dozen field pieces and cannon landed from the gunboats–a force disproportionate to the importance of the town.  It seems a Mexican captain Du Pont had chased from La Paz weeks before had reached Guyamas warning of Du Pont’s approach.

 The following morning, Du Pont sent word to the local commandante that the Mexican vessels and any munitions of war were to be surrendered.  He refused, prompting a threat from Du Pont to bombard the town at 1000 October 7^th, allowing time for women, children, and personal property to be removed to safety.  That morning a deputation of local merchants approached Cyane in a small boat stating the time had been insufficient to clear the village.  Du Pont agreed only to an hour’s extension, not wishing to give the commandante more time to prepare.  As the boatload of locals returned to shore the Mexican flag was seen rising over the derelict gunboats, who soon erupted in flames.  The Mexicans were performing an act Du Pont had intended to do himself!

But Condor remained at anchor very near the dock, within a pistol shot of the militia position.  By 1130 no response had been forthcoming, and Cyane opened, concentrating her fire on the militia position.  Simultaneously two cutters from Cyane carried 45 men led by LT George W. Harrison, LT Higgins, Midshipmen Crabbe and Lewis, and boatswain Collins.  These closed the Mexican brig while shot and shell screamed alow and aloft in both directions.  A steel cable and anchor were cut, and the brig was set ablaze.  Harrison’s party then towed the burning brig away from the town, through a hail of whistling bullets.  Miraculously no one was hit!  Du Pont kept up a vigorous cannonade until the brig had been towed to a distant cove where she burned to the waterline.  Du Pont lingered in Guyamas despite Mexican reinforcements in the form of 400 troops from nearby Hermosilia and 300 mounted Yucca Indians.  No further fighting ensued, and Du Pont departed October 9^th having enforced the blockade and cemented a personal reputation for bold and forceful action.

Watch the POD for more “Today in Naval History”

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Rehabilitation Medicine

Du Pont, Samuel F.  Extracts from Private Journal-Letters of Captain S.F. Du Pont of the Cyane during the War with Mexico, 1846-48 (reprint).  Wilmington, DE: Ferris Brothers, 1885, pp. 61-70.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History:  An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 3rd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 2002, p. 47.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  By the outbreak of the Civil War Samuel F. Du Pont was an experienced and respected senior US Naval officer.  He commanded the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron from September 1861 to July 1863.  He was in the original group of officers promoted to RADM when that rank was authorized in 1862.  Du Pont Circle in Washington, DC, is named in his honor as are the former warships USS Du Pont (TB-7, DD-152, DD-941).

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“TERROR OF THE CHESAPEAKE”

John Yates Beall was born New Year’s Day, 1839, on a farm in Walnut Grove, Virginia (now West Virginia).  His dreams of studying law seemed to come true when he was admitted to the University of Virginia, however the death of his father in 1856 necessitated his return to the family farm.  Decades of political and social strife before the Civil War engendered in him a passion for the southern cause.  This led him, at the outbreak of fighting, to join Bott’s Grays–Company G of the 2^nd Virginia Volunteer Infantry.  But a chest wound he received in a skirmish in the Shenandoah Valley left him unfit for further service.  An undaunted Beall turned to the Confederate Navy, to whom he proposed a brazen plan to harass Union shipping on the Great Lakes.  Wary of angering England, however, Confederate authorities balked.  But they did appoint Beall as an Acting Master, CSN.  Beall then relocated to Mathews County, Virginia, on the western Chesapeake shore with 20-odd men and two oared sail launches, one black and one white, Raven and Swan.

Beall used these boats on the night of 18-19 September to ferry 18 men across the Chesapeake to Virginia’s Eastern Shore.  They coursed around Cape Charles and up the Atlantic coast to a point near present-day Wachapreague Inlet.  Here they discovered the anchored civilian schooner Alliance.  Under the cover of darkness and a heavy squall this morning, they swept aboard and overpowered the few shocked crewmen.  Armed with revolvers, they similarly took the schooners J.J. Houseman, Samuel Pearsall, and Alexandria over the next two days.  When the latter three were found to be “in ballast,” their sails were set, their helms lashed, and they were headed, crewless, in the direction of the open sea.  They took Alliance underway to return to Milford Haven, Mathews County, in an attempt to land her cargo of sutler’s goods valued in today’s equivalent at $200,000.  But upon reaching the bar at Milford Haven, Alliance was spotted by the Union gunboat USS THOMAS FREEBORN.  A few shots spurred Beall to ground the freighter, fire her, and destroy all of her cargo.  The capture of Beall’s second-in-command, Acting Master Edward McGuire, resulted in the escapade’s full revelation.

Now known as the “Terror of the Chesapeake,” Beall was captured on 15 November and held in Fort McHenry, Baltimore, until being exchanged in May 1864.  He immediately returned to vexation, traveling to Lake Erie with plans to free Confederate POWs held on Johnsons Island near Sandusky, Ohio.  This plot failed and led to Beall’s re-capture (in civilian clothes).  He was tried at Fort Columbus, Governor’s Island, New York, and hanged as a spy on 24 February 1865, six weeks before the surrender at Appomattox.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  25 SEP 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Baker, W.W.  Memoirs of Service with John Yates Beall, CSN (reprint of 1910 release).  Staunton, VA: Clarion Pub., 2013, pp. 3-34.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, pp. III 140-41.

Report of Acting Rear-Admiral Lee, U.S. Navy, dtd. 30 Sep 1863.  IN: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of Rebellion, Series I, Vol 9, North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, from May 5, 1862 to May 5, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1899, p. 206.

Report of Captain Gansevoort, U.S. Navy, dtd. 28 Sep 1863.  IN: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of Rebellion, Series I, Vol 9, North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, from May 5, 1862 to May 5, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1899, pp. 203-04.

Report of Lieutenant-Commander Gillis, U.S. Navy, dtd. 27 Sep 1863.  IN: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of Rebellion, Series I, Vol 9, North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, from May 5, 1862 to May 5, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1899, pp. 204-05.

Robinson, William Morrison, Jr.  The Confederate Privateers.  Reprint of 1928 publication, Columbia, SC:  Univ of South Carolina Press, 1994, pp. 221-25.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History:  An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 3^rd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 2002, p. 73.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Milford Haven was an active shipbuilding center for a century before the Civil War.  Milford Haven today is but a map-dot, forgotten except as the location of a US Coast Guard station.

“Master” was not a standard officer grade in that day, rather a title in both civilian and Naval usage to denote someone with the training and experience to conn a ship.  Beall’s full Navy title was Master-Not-in-Line-of-Promotion, a rank that banned him from command of a commissioned vessel and withheld prize money from any captures.  He could, however, draw government stores, recruit sailors not otherwise subject to conscription, and procure ships at his own expense to operate under official auspices.  He was, effectively, a privateer.

The gear Beall salvaged from Alliance included the ship’s charts and nautical instruments–items in short supply and highly coveted in the south.  Of the three schooners cast adrift, crewless, from Wachapreague Inlet, history records the fate of only one.  Samuel Pearsall was corralled on the open sea by the civilian schooner F.F. Randolph and returned to port.

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                                     THE YAZOO CITY SHIPYARD

After the failure of the Yazoo Pass expedition before Confederate Fort Pemberton in March 1863, MGEN Ulysses Grant adopted a new strategy against Vicksburg, the last and most menacing Rebel city preventing Union control of the Mississippi River.  Grant would move his 30,000 troops south on the Louisiana shore, cross the river to the south at Grand Gulf, Mississippi, and move toward Jackson, cutting Vicksburg’s supply line via the Yazoo River.  Union gunboats, necessary to cover Grant’s river crossing, made a daring run past Vicksburg on the dark night of 16-17 April.  Doing so gave them access to the Yazoo, which reaches the Mississippi just south of Vicksburg.  By noon on 18 May 1863 RADM David Dixon Porter found himself on the Yazoo River with the ironclad USS BARON DE KALB and the tinclads CHOCTAW, LINDEN, PETREL, ROMEO, and FOREST ROSE.  Porter was supporting MGEN William T. Sherman’s move up the Yazoo.

At Snyder’s Mill the Rebels had constructed extensive earthworks that would have been a formidable obstruction to Sherman’s and Porter’s advance had not the Confederates abandoned it the day before.  Here Porter’s men found tents, field equipment, supplies, and 14 gun emplacements replete with artillery and ammunition.  A band of Confederates left to recover this material skidaddled at the sight of Porter’s boats.  Porter then sent LCDR John G. Walker ahead in BARON DE KALB to investigate rumors of a Confederate shipyard further upriver in Yazoo City.

DE KALB arrived this day in Yazoo City to find a column of smoke marking the Confederate shipyard.  Three warships lay on the ways nearly completed:  CSS MOBILE awaited only her iron plating; CSS REPUBLIC was being fitted with an iron ram at her bows; and a third 310-foot steamer Walker described as, “a monster,” was about to receive her 4.5″ iron plating.  Her 70-foot beam enclosed six steam engines, powering four paddlewheels and two screw propellers.  She would have given the Union a boatload of trouble indeed!  The steamers were seaworthy enough for Walker to have commandeered them for the Union, but for the lack of pilots to guide them downriver they were burned.  The shipyard was found to have five lumber and planing mills, blacksmith, machine, and carpentry shops, and all manner of equipment necessary to build or repair vessels of any size.  A hospital ashore nursed 150 wounded Confederates, who were paroled, never to fight again.  Walker destroyed the works, conservatively estimated to be worth $2 million in 1863 dollars.

Walker’s return was plagued on the 22^nd by three field pieces and 200 infantry from the shore near Liverpool Landing.  But as quickly as Union guns trained shoreward, the Rebels fled.

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CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

“Additional Report of Acting Rear-Admiral Porter, U.S. Navy, transmitting report of Lieutenant-Commander Walker, U.S. Navy, commanding U.S.S. Baron de Kalb, regarding operations at Yazoo City.”  IN:  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 25, Naval Forces on Western Waters from May 18, 1863, to February 29, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, pp. 7-9.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, pp. III-82-83.

Jones, Virgil Carrington.  The Civil War at Sea:  Vol 2  The River War.  New York, NY:  Holt Rinehart Winston, 1961, pp. 421-22.

“Report of Acting Rear-Admiral Porter, U.S. Navy.”  IN:  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 25, Naval Forces on Western Waters from May 18, 1863, to February 29, 1864.  Washington, DC: GPO, pp. 5-7.

Sweetman, Jack.  American Naval History:  An Illustrated Chronology of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps, 1775-Present, 3rd ed.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 2002, pp. 71-72.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  The Yazoo Pass expedition was an attempt to reach the Yazoo River from the north by breaching the Mississippi River levee opposite Helena, Arkansas.  Doing so flooded a former river channel that connected with Moon Lake, and the Coldwater and Tallahatchie Rivers to reach the Yazoo.  The expedition was halted by the impassable Confederate Fort Pemberton on the Tallahatchie just three miles from the Yazoo.

Tinclads were the most prolific class of gunboat in the Mississippi Squadron of our Civil War.  Each was a former civilian riverboat, purchased by our Navy and reinforced with heavy timber bulwarks overlain with sheet metal.

Most naval squadrons of these days had limited capacity for housing POWs.  Captured soldiers and sailors were therefore paroled.  They signed documents swearing never again to take up arms against the Union and were released in return.  Paroles had mixed effectiveness, especially since soldiers thereby returning to their homes did not wish to be perceived as deserters.

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                                        STAFFORD vs. MANCHEN

Convoy KN-382 coursed its way slowly north from Key West to New York, this night reaching a position 98 miles east of Cape Henry.  The long war looked to be winding down, at least in Europe, where Allied troops were fighting in the streets of Berlin.  The danger of German U-boats was still great however, and four warships of Task Group 02.10 escorted this convoy.  One of them, the patrol frigate NATCHEZ (PF-2), picked up a sonar contact off her starboard bow.  At nearly the same moment lookouts spotted a periscope wake.  Of grave concern was that a schnorkel was also sighted behind the periscope!

A schnorkel was an engineering innovation that allowed the sub to draw air through a snorkel tube, and thus operate her diesel engines while still submerged.  Slow submerged speed was the U-boat’s greatest vulnerability, and this innovation frightened American anti-submarine planners!

LT John H. Stafford, USNR, turned NATCHEZ directly for the sub, hoping to drop depth charges or at least to ram.  COFFMAN (DE-191), BOSTWICK (DE-103), and THOMAS (DE-102) were vectored to the scene as well.  But the sub disappeared before NATCHEZ reached the spot.  Stafford launched a pattern of depth charges and turned back to search again.  Sonar contact was reestablished and the frigate surged forward.  But an emergency turn by the convoy nearly caused a collision, and NATCHEZ had to veer off course.  The frigate again acquired the target, slowed to 10 knots, and launched hedgehogs (programmed to detonate only if they contact an object).  No explosions were heard.  Persisting with the contact now at 1400 yards, Stafford dropped magnetic depth charges that detonate only near a metal object.  Two explosions emanated from great depth, but at 2250 another escort, COFFMAN, acquired the same contact.

Kapitänleutnant Erwin Manchen dove, circled, backed down, changed speeds, fishtailed, and released pillenwerfer, bubble-generating devices to confuse sonar.  But the escorts boxed the contact, and more depth charges blasted the deep.  At 0207 a barrage from NATCHEZ brought oil to the surface.  Attacks continued for two more hours until a deep blast was heard at 0447.  No subsequent contacts were made.  Nothing further was heard from U-879 or her 52 crewmen, even after Germany’s surrender on 7 May.

U-879 had been hunting off our eastern seaboard since mid-April; she had sunk SS Belgian Airman on the 14^th, and damaged the tanker SS Swiftscout on the 23^rd.  She has been confused in both German and American records with U-548, the latter being the probable victim of REUBEN JAMES (DE-153) and BUCKLEY (DE-51) off Sable Island on April 19^th.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  6-7 MAY 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 1 “A-B”.  (letter “B” and appendices), Washington, DC: GPO, 1959, p. 170.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 5 “N-Q”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1979, p. 20.

Morison, Samuel Eliot.  History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol X  The Atlantic Battle Won.  Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Co., 1956, p. 344.

Roscoe, Theodore.  United States Destroyer Operations in World War II.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1953, p. 513.

Wynn, Kenneth.  U-Boat Operations of the Second World War  Vol 2: Career Histories, U511-UIT25.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1998, pp. 26, 182.

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                                      SKIRMISH AT FORT LOWRY

We are familiar with inspiring stories of epic battles and heroic sailors, but the day-to-day operations of Civil War gunboats were often less dramatic.

The Potomac Flotilla, tasked with protecting Washington, DC, and the upper Chesapeake, numbered 23 vessels by the beginning of 1865.  Most were converted flat-bottom ferryboats, shallow draft tugs, and small sloops and schooners.  Each was under 600 tons, mounting 2-6 guns.  USS MORSE was typical.  Built in 1859 as the sidewheel ferryboat Marion, she displaced 514 tons and measured 143 feet in length.  She was purchased in November 1861 and outfitted with six guns including a pair of 100-pounder rifles.  After service in the Carolinas, MORSE steamed to the Chesapeake in 1863.

By February 1865, GEN Robert E. Lee had only 45,000 Confederate troops remaining to resist GEN U.S. Grant’s siege of Petersburg, Virginia.  While further north, the Potomac Flotilla escorted a US Army detachment in mopping up Rebel activities on the peninsula between the Rappahannock and Potomac Rivers.  Earlier in the war, Rebels from this area had launched daring raids in the Chesapeake.  The town of Tappahannock occupies this peninsula, protected then by an earthwork fortification, Fort Lowry.  Advanced scouting by Acting LCDR Edward Hooker in USS COMMODORE READ had revealed the presence of three Rebel 10-pounder rifles in the area, two at the fort and one at Jones Point lower on the Rappahannock.

On this day, the gunboats USS COMMODORE READ, MORSE, DELAWARE, and the Army’s MOSSWOOD steamed up the Rappahannock.  Hooker’s reconnaissance proved accurate, for at 0800 MORSE came under fire.  The offending 2-gun battery was completely concealed, not even their muzzle flashes could be spotted. Acting Master George W. Hyde returned fire, but for two hours his gunners targeted only bushes and shadows.  MORSE’s suffered a battered carpenter shop and the bulkhead between steerage and the medical spaces was wrecked.  Portholes were smashed, and 20 panes of glass elsewhere were shattered.  At 1000 the still hidden guns fell silent.

This day’s excitement now over, MORSE and DELAWARE turned to destroying nine boats and the bridge connecting Tappahannock with Fort Lowry.  The fort itself was found to be deserted, but the gunboats bombarded it regardless.  Operations halted at 1800 when MORSE ran aground in the poorly charted river.  A modicum of effort freed her, and by 1930 all had returned to the Union held wharf.

The following morning’s enlivenment featured only the grounding of the sidewheel steamer USS BANSHEE–finally refloated by the tide.  The overall mission now completed, Rebel activities on the peninsula largely ended.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  19 MAR 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, p. V-61.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 4 “L-M”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1969, p. 440.

“Report of Acting Master Hyde, U.S. Navy, commanding U.S.S. MORSE, of engagement with Confederate battery near Fort Lowry, Va.”  IN:  Rush, Richard and Robert H. Woods.  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 5, Operations on the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers from December 7, 1861, to July 31, 1865; Atlantic Blockading Squadron from April 4 to July 15, 1861.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1897, p. 530.

“Report of executive officer, U.S.S. MORSE, of injuries sustained by that vessel in engagement with Confederate battery near Fort Lowry, Va.”  IN:  Rush, Richard and Robert H. Woods.  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 5, Operations on the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers from December 7, 1861, to July 31, 1865; Atlantic Blockading Squadron from April 4 to July 15, 1861.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1897, p. 531.

“Semimonthly statement of vessels of the Potomac Flotilla.”  IN: Rush, Richard and Robert H. Woods.  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 5, Operations on the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers from December 7, 1861, to July 31, 1865; Atlantic Blockading Squadron from April 4 to July 15, 1861.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1897, p. 531.

Silverstone, Paul H.  Warships of the Civil War Navies.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1989, pp. 70, 101.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Fort Lowry has been lost to history.  It had been built in 1861 as an 8-gun battery to counter Union incursions toward Fredricksburg, Virginia.  But situated as it was on swampy ground near Lowry Point, the fort was subject to frequent flooding and erosion over the years.  Its presence is remembered today only with a roadside marker near Dunnsville, Virginia.

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                      BATTLE OF ELIZABETH CITY (cont. from 8 FEB)

Union forces from the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron had driven a Confederate “mosquito fleet” from Roanoke Island, and at 1430 on the afternoon of February 9^th, CDR Stephen C. Rowan pursued.  Rowan weighed anchor in the schooner-rigged sidewheeler USS DELAWARE and rallied UNDERWRITER, COMMODORE PERRY, and MORSE in a van leading 10 smaller gunboats in column.  Upon entering the Albemarle Sound they sighted the smoke of the enemy escaping up the Pasquotank River.  Rowan followed, but nightfall stopped his progress 10 miles below Cobb’s Point, where the Confederates had built a battery on the riverbank.

Shortly after 0800 this morning, Rowan sighted the Confederates, whose gunboats had taken refuge under the four 32-pounders of Fort Cobb.  On the opposite bank, the schooner BLACK WARRIOR was moored, bringing her two 32-pounders to the action as well.  Rowan signaled a dash for the enemy, and the Rebel batteries opened.  Shot and shell pierced the air, many arching over Rowan to strike his following column.  Rowan’s flotilla closed regardless, holding their fire and keeping formation.

The specter of the opening Union cannonade at 600 yards struck panic into the Confederates!  Those serving the shore battery fled after firing only their initial volley.  The few dozen local militia that had shown up sheepishly the day before, broke formation and deserted.  Individual Union gunboats now paired off against Rebel steamers.  USS CERES grappled the Confederate CSS ELLIS and swarmed boarders across.  Rebel skipper, CDR James W. Cooke, ordered his men to abandon ship over the side, while he and a few loyal sailors held up the Yankees with cutlasses.  In a final act, he set ELLIS ablaze, only to the fires extinguished by the onrushing Union sailors.  The gunboat was captured by the Yankees.  Most of the other Rebel crews fired their ships as well and fled overboard.  CSS FANNY, SEA BIRD, and BLACK WARRIOR were burned or scuttled.  BEAUFORT and RALRIGH escaped up the canal to Norfolk.  Had not CSS APPOMATTOX been just two inches too wide, she might have escaped up the canal as well. 

In short order Rowan’s force routed what feeble resistance remained.  Shore parties destroyed Confederate warehouses, war matériel, and several gunboats still under construction.  Two schooners were found to be moored to the city’s wharf, one loaded with furniture and the other with grain.  These were towed into the North River cut and scuttled to block access to the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal.  Having crushed enemy naval strength in the area and secured Union control of North Carolina’s sounds, Rowan turned back for the Fleet.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  17 FEB 24 

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Civil War Naval Chronology 1861-1865.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1961, p. II-20.

“Detailed report of Commander Rowan, U.S. Navy, commanding second division in the sounds of North Carolina.”  IN:  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 6, North Atlantic Blockading Squadron from October 29, 1861, to March 8, 1862.”  Washington, DC: GPO, pp. 606-09.

“Report of Lieutenant Chaplin, U.S. Navy, commanding U.S.S. Valley City, transmitting surgeon’s report of casualties.”  IN:  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series I, Vol 6, North Atlantic Blockading Squadron from October 29, 1861, to March 8, 1862.”  Washington, DC: GPO, pp. 614-15.

Trotter, William R.  Ironclads and Columbiads:  The Civil War in North Carolina, The Coast.  Winston-Salem, NC: John F. Blair Pub., 1989, pp. 88-91.

Silverstone, Paul H.  Warships of the Civil War Navies.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1989, pp. 81, .

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  CDR Cooke above would later captain the infamous Confederate ironclad CSS ALBEMARLE on her successful sortie against the Union squadron at Plymouth, North Carolina.  The Union gunboat UNDERWRITER would earn even greater fame later in the war as a platform for raids up North Carolina’s rivers.

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