CONFEDERATE PRIVATEER PETREL

When South Carolina seceded from the Union on 20 December 1860, the State’s officials seized Federal property including the US Revenue Cutter Service schooner WILLIAM AIKEN, 2, who had operated out of Charleston since 1855.  WILLIAM AIKEN thus earned the dubious distinction of being the first Federal ship lost to the Rebels.  But by 1861, AIKEN was aging ungraciously, having served for years before her USRCS purchase as the pilot boat Eclipse.  The Confederate Navy deemed her unseaworthy and she was sold instead to private investors who sought to convert her to a privateer.  The Confederate government was issuing Letters of Marque allowing private citizens to arm private vessels to pursue and capture Union merchant ships for profit.  On 10 July 1861, WILLIAM AIKEN’s investors received their letter of marque and AIKEN became the Rebel privateer PETREL.  Her career would prove a short one!

In the early morning hours of this day, PETREL’s captain, William Perry, took his schooner out of Charleston on her first cruise.  He spotted what he took to be an East Indiaman.  He approached cautiously, flying British colors, until he had closed sufficiently to observe uniformed sailors on her deck!  Clearly, she was a military vessel, in fact, she was USS ST. LAWRENCE, a 50-gun frigate under the command of CAPT Hugh Y. Purviance, who had been sent to blockade the Rebel city.  Some accounts suggest that CAPT Purviance had disguised his frigate as a merchantman, or, more likely, Perry simply mistook the frigate.  The chase was on after lookouts aboard ST. LAWRENCE spotted the schooner off their lee bow at 0600.  In four hours, the frigate closed enough to hail the stranger.  Perry now had no escape and ran up Confederate colors.  He rounded and sent three shots from PETREL’s guns.  One passed through ST. LAWRENCE’s mainsail and splintered the main yardarm.  Purviance’s gunnery was more telling.  His fo’c’sle battery opened with two shots that struck PETREL’s hull.  The privateer’s bows were smashed and flooding forced her abandonment in 30 minutes.  Thirty-six Confederates were fished from the water and put aboard the north-bound steamer Flag to be tried and hanged as pirates in Philadelphia.  The accusation did not hold up in court however, and PETREL’s sailors were instead confined to Moyamensing Prison in Philadelphia for the duration of the war.

Confederate privateers enjoyed some limited success in the early days of the war.  However, the establishment of the blockade made trade with the Confederacy risky.  Northern merchants shifted trade elsewhere, avoiding the South, and Rebel privateers suffered for lack of targets.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  4 AUG 22

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

American Civil War website.  “The USS St. Lawrence sinks Confederate Privateer Petrel.”  AT: http://www.civilwar-online.com/2011/07/july-28-1861-uss-st-lawrence-sinks.html, retrieved 18 March 2014.

“Capture of C.S. Privateer Petrel, William Perry commanding, by the U.S.S. St. Lawrence, Captain Purviance, U.S. Navy, commanding, July 28, 1861.”  IN:  Official Records of the Union and Confederate Navies in the War of the Rebellion, Series 1, Vol 1: The Operations of the Cruisers from January 19, 1861, to December 31, 1862.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1894, p. 51.

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

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 6 “R-S”.  Washington, DC: GPO, 1976, pp. 242-43.

Robinson, William.  The Confederate Privateers. 

US Coast Guard History website.  “William Aiken, 1855.”  AT: http://www.uscg.mil/history.webcutters/Aiken1855.asp, retrieved 18 March 2014.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  USRCS WILLIAM AIKEN honored William Aiken, Jr., (1806-1887) the 61^st Governor of South Carolina

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