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Wilmington, North Carolina , was a major port for the Confederacy during the American Civil War. It was the last port to fall to the Union Army (February 1865), completing its blockade of the Atlantic coast.
Wilmington, located 30 miles upstream from the mouth of the Cape Fear River (which flows into the Atlantic Ocean), was among the Confederacy's more important cities. It ranked 13th in size in the CSA (although only 100th in the pre-war United States) with a population of 9,553 according to the 1860 census, making it nearly the same size as Atlanta, Georgia, at the time.
Wilmington was one of the most important points of entry for supplies for the entire Confederate States. Its port traded cotton and tobacco in exchange for foreign goods, such as munitions, clothing and foodstuffs. This nourished both the southern states in general and specifically General Robert E. Lee's forces in Virginia. The trade was based on steamer ships of British smugglers. These vessels were called blockade runners because they had to penetrate the Union's extensive and efficient blockade.
The blockade runners operated indirectly from British colonies–such as Bermuda, the Bahamas, or Nova Scotia. Along with vital supplies, the blockade runners brought foreign crews, who poured money into the local economy through bars, taverns, hotels, shops, and merchants. The town soon took on an international flavor not seen before the war.
In the summer of 1862, sailors arrived who were infected with yellow fever, which was endemic in the Caribbean. An epidemic soon paralyzed the once-thriving waterfront, as well as much of the city. Nearly 1,000 people contracted the disease, and more than 300 died before the illness had run its course and activity resumed.
After the fall of Norfolk, Virginia in May 1862, Wilmington's importance increased. It became the main Confederate port on the Atlantic Ocean. Along the Atlantic seashore, Wilmington's defenses were so sturdy that they were only surpassed by Charleston's fortifications in South Carolina. Wilmington resisted Federal occupation for a long time, mainly due to Fort Fisher.
Blockade running became an organized industry. The Crenshaw Company organized shipments of cotton from the interior of the Confederacy to Wilmington for smuggling through the blockade to England.
Wilmington was not captured by Union forces until February 22, 1865, approximately one month after the fall of Fort Fisher. The Battle of Wilmington consisted of a series of three small engagements near the Cape Fear River that led to the abandonment of the city by the Confederate forces under General Braxton Bragg. Before leaving, Bragg ordered the large quantities of bales of cotton and tobacco burned to prevent their falling into Union hands. Maj. Gen. Jacob D. Cox led the first Federal troops into Wilmington, and his forces occupied the city for the rest of the war.
As almost all the military action was at some distance from the city, a number of antebellum homes and other buildings have survived in downtown Wilmington.
The outbreak of the Civil War brought danger to Wilmington in the form of crime, disease, threat of invasion, and "downright bawdiness." [1] This prompted many slave owners to move inland, resulting in less supervision over those they were enslaving. [1] During a rainy night on September 21, 1862, William B. Gould and George Price escaped with six other enslaved men [lower-alpha 1] by rowing a small boat 28 nautical miles (52 km) down the Cape Fear River. [3] [4] [5] [6] They embarked on Orange Street, just four blocks from where Gould lived on Chestnut St. [lower-alpha 2] [5] [6] Sentries were posted along the river, adding additional danger. [5] The boat had a sail, but they did not raise it until they were out in the Atlantic for fear of being seen. [5]
Just as the dawn was breaking on September 22, they rushed out into the Atlantic Ocean near Fort Caswell and hoisted their sail. [4] [3] [5] There, the USS Cambridge of the Union blockade picked them up as contraband. [3] [6] Other ships in the blockade picked up two other boats containing friends of Gould in what may have been a coordinated effort. [8] [1] [9] [lower-alpha 3] Though they had no way of knowing it, within an hour and a half of their rescue President Abraham Lincoln convened a meeting of his cabinet to finalize plans to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. [4] [8] [6]
The Second Battle of Fort Fisher was a successful assault by the Union Army, Navy and Marine Corps against Fort Fisher, south of Wilmington, North Carolina, near the end of the American Civil War in January 1865. Sometimes referred to as the "Gibraltar of the South" and the last major coastal stronghold of the Confederacy, Fort Fisher had tremendous strategic value during the war, providing a port for blockade runners supplying the Army of Northern Virginia.
The Anaconda Plan was a strategy outlined by the Union Army for suppressing the Confederacy at the beginning of the American Civil War. Proposed by Union General-in-Chief Winfield Scott, the plan emphasized a Union blockade of the Southern ports and called for an advance down the Mississippi River to cut the South in two. Because the blockade would be rather passive, it was widely derided by a vociferous faction of Union generals who wanted a more vigorous prosecution of the war and likened it to the coils of an anaconda suffocating its victim. The snake image caught on, giving the proposal its popular name.
USS Advance, the second United States Navy ship to be so named, was later known as USS Frolic, and was originally the blockade runner Advance captured by the Union Navy during the latter part of the American Civil War. She was purchased by the Union Navy and outfitted as a gunboat and assigned to the blockade of the waterways of the Confederate States of America. She also served as dispatch ship and supply vessel when military action eventually slowed.
John Newland Maffitt was an officer in the Confederate States Navy who was nicknamed the "Prince of Privateers" due to his success as a blockade runner and commerce raider in the U.S. Civil War.
The first USS Sassacus, a wooden, double-ended, sidewheel steamer in commission in the United States Navy from 1863 to 1865. She saw service in the American Civil War.
CSS Robert E. Lee was a fast paddle-steamer, originally built as a Glasgow-Belfast packet boat named Giraffe, which was bought as a blockade runner for the Confederate States during the American Civil War, then subsequently served in the United States Navy as USS Fort Donelson and in the Chilean Navy as Concepción.
Fort Fisher was a Confederate fort during the American Civil War. It protected the vital trading routes of the port at Wilmington, North Carolina, from 1861 until its capture by the Union in 1865. The fort was located on one of Cape Fear River's two outlets to the Atlantic Ocean on what was then known as Federal Point or Confederate Point and today is known as Pleasure Island. The strength of Fort Fisher led to its being called the Southern Gibraltar and the "Malakoff Tower of the South". The battle of Fort Fisher was the most decisive battle of the Civil War fought in North Carolina.
The second USS Niagara was a screw frigate in the United States Navy.
The Union blockade in the American Civil War was a naval strategy by the United States to prevent the Confederacy from trading.
USS Niphon was a steam operated vessel acquired by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Navy to patrol navigable waterways of the Confederacy to prevent the South from trading with other countries.
The first USS Nansemond, a side wheel steamer built at Williamsburg, N.Y. in 1862, as James F. Freeborn, was purchased by the Union Navy at New York City on 18 August 1863 from Richard Squires; it was renamed Nansemond and commissioned at Baltimore on 19 August, with Lieutenant Roswell H. Lamson in command.
The Union Navy was the United States Navy (USN) during the American Civil War, when it fought the Confederate States Navy (CSN). The term is sometimes used carelessly to include vessels of war used on the rivers of the interior while they were under the control of the United States Army, also called the Union Army.
USS Cambridge was a heavy steamship purchased by the Union Navy at the start of the American Civil War.
William Benjamin Gould Sr. was a former enslaved person and veteran of the American Civil War, serving in the U.S. Navy. His diary is one of only a few written during the Civil War by a formerly enslaved person that has survived, and the only by a formerly enslaved sailor.
USS Huron was a Unadilla-class gunboat built for the United States Navy during the American Civil War for blockage duty against the ports and rivers of the Confederate States of America.
USS Aries was an 820-ton iron screw steamer built at Sunderland, England, during 1861–1862, intended for employment as a blockade runner during the American Civil War. She was captured by Union Navy forces during the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America, and was commissioned as a Union gunboat. Aries was named for the constellation.
USS Tristram Shandy was a 444-ton steamer and blockade runner captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War.
USS Britannia was a steamer captured by the Union Navy during the American Civil War. She was used by the Union Navy as a gunboat and patrol vessel in support of the Union Navy blockade of Confederate waterways.
During the American Civil War, blockade runners were used to get supplies through the Union blockade of the Confederate States of America that extended some 3,500 miles (5,600 km) along the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coastlines and the lower Mississippi River. The Confederacy had little industrial capability and could not indigenously produce the quantity of arms and other supplies needed to fight against the Union. To meet this need, numerous blockade runners were constructed in the British Isles and were used to import the guns, ordnance and other supplies that the Confederacy desperately needed, in exchange for cotton that the British textile industry needed greatly. To penetrate the blockade, these relatively lightweight shallow draft ships, mostly built in British shipyards and specially designed for speed, but not suited for transporting large quantities of cotton, had to cruise undetected, usually at night, through the Union blockade. The typical blockade runners were privately owned vessels often operating with a letter of marque issued by the Confederate government. If spotted, the blockade runners would attempt to outmaneuver or simply outrun any Union Navy warships on blockade patrol, often successfully.
George W. Price, Jr. was a laborer, sailor, and politician in North Carolina. An African American, he served in the North Carolina House of Representatives and North Carolina Senate during the Reconstruction era.