Rumors of this daring plan reached Lt. Stuyvesant of the USS Minnesota, on July 18 and he warned the Navy department and Rear Admiral Lee that Wood was reported to have left Richmond with 800 volunteers on July 7-8. The projected expedition caused considerable excitement among Union authorities, President Davis, on 10 July, had already advised against it.
Wood reported that he was ready to run the blockade out of Wilmington on 9 July, but the Confederate President warned him: "The object and destination of the expedition have somehow become so generally known that I fear your operation will meet unexpected obstacles."
The expedition was abandoned, but did show the extreme measures the South contemplated as the war turned against them.
--Old B-R'er
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