From the Civil War Naval Chronology.
Efforts to maintain the blockade continually improved, but blockade-runners, stirred by patriotism and especially lured by profit, continued to elude Union warships.
Captain Sands of the USS Dacotah, off the Cape Fear River, North Carolina, reported a typical example:
"I had a picket boat from this vessel inside the bar, and one from the Monticello was anchored at the bar in 13-feet of water. The latter saw nothing of the blockade runner [Giraffe], but my picket boat, in charge of Acting Master W[illiam] Earle, saw her pass between him and the shore, and came near being run over by her soon after discovering her.
The boat was anchored in 12-feet of water on the western side of the channel, with the fort [Fort Fisher] bearing N.N.E., and the steamer passed between her and the beach, evidently having tacked the beach along, where, under cover of the dark land, she could not be seen a quarter of a mile off in the obscurity of the hour before daylight....
The Chocura was stationed at the Western Bar, the Monticello farther west, near the shore, and the Dacotah guarding the approaches to the bar. Yet neither vessel, with all their accustomed watchfulness, saw anything of the blockade runner, and it is with much chagrin that I am obliged thus to report a rebel success."
Sneaky B_Rs. --Old B-Runner
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