FT. FISHER FAILURE

Several factors made Wilmington, North Carolina, a valuable entry port for blockade running.  Wilmington was equidistant from the main smuggling bases in Nassau and Bermuda, with good rail connections inland.  Positioned 28 miles up the Cape Fear River, she was out of range of deep-water Union guns.  Entrance from the Atlantic could be afforded by either of two channels, and Union patrols had difficulty covering both.  In addition, the northern channel, New Inlet, was guarded by the 75 guns of the massive earthen-walled Fort Fisher.  Wilmington had been transformed by blockade running.  As the rest of the South crumbled toward the end of the war, the steady supply of life’s finery and the affluence of a high profit industry were a cultural boon to the Cape Fear region.  As well, success attracted the undesirable speculators, gamblers, and riff-raff.  Both Lee and Grant appreciated what Wilmington represented to the South’s war effort.  Thus, in late 1864, the capture of Wilmington became a priority for the new commander of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, RADM David Dixon Porter.

Porter’s first obstacle, Fort Fisher, was probably the Confederacy’s most impregnable fortification.  Located athwart a narrow spit of land running due south into the mouth of the Cape Fear River, laborers had worked unheeded for four years to perfect the works and extensive bombproofs.  The saw-toothed palisade was formidable, but in particular, the loose, sandy earth of the walls and floors swallowed cannonballs without damage.  Porter’s 55-ship Union Navy flotilla, the largest ever assembled to that day, arrived off Ft. Fisher on December 20^th.

Porter’s first attempt on the 23^rd was a bombship.  The sidewheel steamer LOUISIANA was laden with 350 tons of gunpowder and towed near the fort.  Her detonation that evening was impressive, but alas, ineffective.  Porter then rained upon Ft. Fisher an intensive two-day bombardment, at times reaching a rate of fire of 115 rounds per minute.  Assigned to Porter were 6500 Union Army troops under the dubiously capable MGEN Benjamin F. Butler, who had previously bungled an attack on Richmond.  On Christmas Day, 3000 of Butler’s troops were landed north of the fort for an assault.  But these troops were surprised to observe that Ft. Fisher had withstood two days of intensive bombardment with little visible damage.  Confederate commander COL William Lamb had lost fewer men than had been claimed by accidental explosions on the attacking Union ships!  He was able to man the palisade in force against the assault, pinning down Butler’s men through the day.  Unable to land more troops because of souring weather, Butler reembarked the stranded landing force.  Porter was furious, but his ships had exhausted their ammunition in the pre-Christmas bombardment, and he was forced to re-group.

Continued 15 JAN 2025…

Anderson, Bern.  By Sea and by River:  The Naval History of the Civil War.  New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1962, pp. 276-84.

Fowler, William M., Jr.  Under Two Flags: The American Navy in the Civil War.  New York, NY: Avon Books, 1990, pp. 263, 266-72.

Gragg, Rod.  Confederate Goliath:  The Battle of Fort Fisher.  Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State Univ. Press, 1991.

Page, Dave.  Ships Versus Shore:  Civil War Engagements along Southern Shores and Rivers.  Nashville, TN: Rutledge Hill Press, 1994, pp. 82-102.

Reed, Michael and John T. Kuehn.  “Triumph of Civil War ‘Jointness.'”  Naval History, Vol 27 (6), December 2013, pp. 32-39.

Robinson, Charles M.  Hurricane of Fire:  The Union Assault on Fort Fisher.  Annapolis, MD: USNI Press, 1998.

Site visit, Fort Fisher State Park, Kure City, North Carolina, 8 December 2001.

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                                     THE CHARGE UP COYOTEPE

The US Marines had been in Nicaragua off and on since December 1909, each time to quell civil unrest and prop-up conservative pro-American governments.  In this latest foray, the administration of Adolfo Díaz had fallen under attack from separate factions led by his Minister of War, General Luís Mena, and a rebel military officer, General Benjamin Zeledón.  Like most Nicaraguan revolts, innocent peasants were brutalized as much as was political stability threatened.  COL Joseph “Uncle Joe” Pendleton’s 1200 Marines quieted key coastal cities and the capital of Managua in the summer of 1912.  Then a detachment of 400 led by MAJ Smedley Darlington Butler was sent by train packed with Red Cross supplies to the last holdout of General Mena, the town of Granada.

Straddling the railroad on the way were opposing hills upon which General Zeledón had entrenched his rebels and light artillery.  The smaller Barranca Hill rose 250 feet above the railroad, while opposing Coyotepe’s steep slopes doubled that height.  Once Granada had been secured (and Mena captured), Butler turned his attention to Zeledón’s rebels on these hills.  Earthworks ringed with barbed wire and machine guns atop both hills sheltered 2000 rebels.  On the evening of 2 October, Butler’s men moved into position at the base of the hills.  Their light artillery kept rebel heads down through the following day until the arrival of Pendleton’s main force that evening.

Morning fog this day filled the valleys but spared the two hilltops.  It shrouded the American formations, MAJ William N. McKelvy’s 1^st Battalion in the center, flanked on the right by a battalion of bluejackets from the cruiser CALIFORNIA (ACR-6).  To the left stood Butler’s Marines and a company of sailors from ANNAPOLIS (PG-10).  At 0515 the assault stepped off.  About 20 paces from the first line of barbed wire, a shot rang out from the top of the hill.  The Americans opened at heads popping up over Coyotepe’s trenches.  Enemy fire was intense but poorly aimed.  In alternating rushes, the sailor and Marine companies cut through the barbed wire and forged up the hill.  At the last line of wire one Marine calmly stood against the fury to cut a path, only to be struck dead as he finished his task.  A bayonet charge covered the last stretch to the crest of Coyotepe.  At this, the rebels broke and ran.  The Marines next turned the enemy guns on Barranca and quickly cleared that hilltop.  The entire affair was over in 40 minutes.  Seven Marines and sailors lay dead, 14 wounded, and 60 rebels had been killed.  General Zeledón was apparently shot by his own men as he tried to escape.  With the occupation of the town of León later in October, rebel resistance was temporarily quelled.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  10 OCT 22

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Heinl, Robert Debs, Jr.  Soldiers of the Sea:  The United States Marine Corps, 1775-1962.  Baltimore, MD: Nautical & Aviation Pub., 1991, pp. 169-70.

Metcalf, Clyde H.  A History of the United States Marine Corps.  New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1939, pp. 413-15.

Millett, Allan R.  Semper Fidelis:  The History of the United States Marine Corps.  New York, NY: Macmillan Pub Co., 1980, p. 170.

Moskin, J. Robert.  The U.S. Marine Corps Story, 3^rd ed.  Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Co., 1992, p. 162.

Musicant, Ivan.  The Banana Wars:  A History of United States Military Intervention in Latin America from the Spanish-American War to the Invasion of Panama.  New York, NY: Macmillan, 1990, pp. 137-56.

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. 114.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Adolfo Díaz was re-elected in the subsequent balloting, and the Marines were withdrawn in November.  Their respite would be short-lived, for they would return to Nicaragua several times in the following decades.

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