Confederate Shipbuilding in England

From the September 19, 2021, Advocate (Baton Rouge, Louisiana) ) "Confederate ships topic for BRCWRT" by George Morris.

Patrick Martin spoke  about Confederate ships made in England before the Baton Rouge Civil War Round Table on August 19.

Martin noted that at the beginning of the Civil War,  the Confederacy  did not have a Navy of facilities to construct and equip warships.  Confederate states did not have the industrial base of the North, so shipbuilding was undertaken on a much smaller scale.

Early in the war, Union General Winfield Scott drew up a strategy known as the Anaconda Plan to restrict  water access to Southern ports, which would  deny the Confederacy   of needed supplies.

This would be the blockade of the Southern coast.

Confederate Navy Secretary Stephen Mallory immediately embarked in a program that involved foreign shipyards to build ocean-going ships  to draw the Union Navy away from the South and disrupt international commerce going to the North.

Three commerce raiders were built for the Confederacy  in Liverpool, England.  The most famous of these was the CSS Alabama commanded by Captain, later Admiral, Raphael Semmes, which sank 64 Union vessels until it was sunk by the USS Kearsarge in the English Channel.

Semmes was rescued from the channel by a yacht and taken to England where he was received as a hero.

The other two ships were the CSS Florida and CSS Shenandoah.

After the war, England was made to pay damages by the ships built for the Confederacy.

--Old B-Runner

July 1-3, 1865-- Part 2: CSS Shenandoah's Trials and Tribulations Out in the Cold

"When the Shenandoah reached the Island of St. Lawrence, there was a fine northwest wind.  Sail was made, and the propeller triced up.  While to the westward of that island, the ship was making six knots per hour. a dense fog came on...."

Trying to beat out of the ice the ship ran into a large floe and damaged her rudder when, with sails aback to avoid sudden collision with thick ice, "she gathered sternboard."  The crew placed heavy rope mats around the prow.

"Steam was gently applied and with a large block of ice resting against her cutwater she pushed it along to open a passage, and in this way we worked the Shenandoah for hours until she gained open water."

To avoid being trapped by Federal cruisers, if not the ice, Waddell decided to run for "more open seas."  On 3 July "a black fog closed upon us and shut out from our view the heavens and all things terrestrial."  It clung about them thick and ominous for the next two days as the raider steamed south depending on dead reckoning."

Want Some Ice With That Water?  --Old B-Runner

July 1-3, 1865-- Part 1: CSS Shenandoah Digging Icebergs and Watching the Sun

JULY 1ST TO 3RD, 1865:  After destroying a large fleet of Arctic whalers on June 26 and 28,  the CSS Shenendoah, Lt. James Waddell,  stood south "amid snow and icebergs" looking for more victims.

There he wrote, in "the immensity of the ice and floes", threatened with "danger of being shut up in the Arctic Ocean for several months. I was obliged to turn her prow southward and reached East Cape just in time to slip by the Diomedes when a vast field of floe ice was closing the strait....

"The sun was in his highest northern declination, and it was perpetual daylight, when he sank below the northern horizon, a golden fringe marked his course until his pale and cheerless face came again, frosted from icebergs and snow."

Lt. James Waddell Waxing Poetic.  --Old BRunBerg

June 16, 1865: The CSS Shenandoah Is Still Cruising in the Pacific, Unaware the War Is Over

JUNE 16TH, 1865:  For two days the CSS Shenandoah had sailed  northward in a fog that fortunately lifted partly just in time to enable her to miss running aground as she passed west of the Aleutians.

Three days later, half way across the world, Commander Bulloch wrote to Lieutenant Waddell, ordering him to desist from further destruction of United States property upon the high seas and all offensive  operations against U.S. citizens.

Of course, these were orders that would not be delivered for many weeks even under the best of conditions.  Therefore, American whalers were destined to suffer disastrous blows.

--Old B-R'er

May 21, 1865: CSS Shenandoah in the Sea of Okhotsk

MAY 21ST, 1865:  The CSS Shenandoah entered the Sea of Okhotsk "and ran along the coast of Kamchatka under sail.  There is a strong current along the Pacific side of these islands, setting to the M.E. which clings to the eastern shore on the Arctic  Ocean, and how much further north man knoweth not."

--Old B-R'er

Bennett W, Green, CSN-- Part 8: His Button in a Museum

From Antiquescientifica.

This button is now in the American Civil War Museum.

There is a guilt brass CSN coat button with an identification tag dated 1894, that said the button belonged to Surgeon Bennett Wood Green (died 1913).  Charlottesville, Virginia.

It refers to a photograph that says they were officers of the CSS Shenandoah.  I wrote about this photograph earlier and believe some of the officers were from the Shenanoah, but I don't thing Green was.  But, he was in England after the war and had served on the CSS Stonewall.

--Old B-Runner

Bennett Green-- Part 2: A Photograph Taken in England, Autumn 1865

From ibiblio.org  Acting Master Irvine S. Bulloch, CSN (1861-1865)

Photo # NH 59499  Former Confederate Naval officers.  Taken Leamington Spa, England, Autumn 1865, following the return of the CSS Shenandoah.

Included:

Former Assistant Surgeon Edwin G. Booth
Former Acting Master Irvine S. Bulloch of the CSS Shenandoah
Former Passed Assistant Surgeon Bennett W. Green
Former 1st Lieutenant William H. Murdaugh
Former Passed Assistant Surgeon Charles H. Lining of the CSS Shenandoah

--Old B-R'er

Irvine Stephens Bulloch-- Part 3: Promoted, But No Country to Serve

Continued from November 21st.

After the loss of the his ship, the CSS Alabama, Irvine Bulloch returned to Liverpool and set out on the ship Laurent on October 1864 to join the CSS Shenandoah as its sailing master.  It was Bulloch who navigated the ship from off San Francisco when they found out for sure that the war was over, to Liverpool where the ship surrendered to English authorities on November 6, 1865.

Once there, he found that he had been promoted to lieutenant, but he now had no country to serve.

--Old B-Runner

The End of the CSS Shenandoah-- Part 2: Next Object, Find the Wreck

The CSS Shenandoah was put up for auction and purchased by the Sultan of Omar and Zanzibar and renamed Majidi.  Following repairs she went to Zanzibar and was home ported at Stone Harbour. and was originally used as the Sultan's personal yacht for a number of years sailing between ports in Zanzibar and Oman.  Eventually she also began carrying coal, clover and gum as a merchant ship.

In early April 1972, while at anchor in Stone Harbour, a tremendous storm struck the coast of Zanzibar.  More than a hundred ships were blown ashore and the Majidi was one of them.  The ship was refloated, but had heavy damage to her hull and decking.  Pumped dry, it was towed to Bombay by the British Salvage Company.

The ship returned to service in July 1872, she sailed with a German captain and native crew; but after departing Stone Harbour on her first voyage, she vanished.  It was several weeks before the HMS Briton was reported to have recovered several survivors adrift from the ship in the Mozambique Channel.  The captain of the Briton said some of the survivors accused the German captain of deliberately running the Majidi aground and was ordered to allow a German shipbuilding company to offer a replacement vessel.

The wreck of the former cruiser CSS Shenandoah is still out there, on a reef somewhere in the Mozambique Channel.

Maybe Mr. Ballard should start looking for it.

--Old B-Runner

The End of the CSS Shenandoah-- Part 1: Visited by Waddell

From the November/December Confederate Veteran Magazine "The CSS Shenandoah" by Ian Dewar, President of 290 Foundation (BVI), Inc.  I have written about the organization earlier.

The article covered the ship's whole career and had a map of the world showing the Shenandoah's circumnavigation of it.  I will pick up the story of what happened to the ship after its surrender.

The Shenandoah was then towed to the newly completed dock called Herculaneum to await possession by the U.S. government.  The U.S. consul in Liverpool was ordered to find a crew and captain to sail her back to the U.S.  Captain Freeman from the New York area was hired and he found a crew of 55.

The winter of 1865-1866 was particularly bad with storms and after a month at sea, Freeman was forced to return to Liverpool.  He reported the Shenandoah badly needed repairs and managed to find other things to do rather than attempt another voyage.

The Shenandoah remained in Liverpool until the end of 1866 and was often visited by former commander James Waddell, who had elected to remain in Liverpool (with the fear of being executed in the U.S. for piracy).

--Old B-Runner

Irvine Stephens Bulloch-- Part 1: Brother of James Bulloch and Teddy Roosevelt's Uncle

From Wikipedia.

Yesterday I posted about Irvine Bulloch being the officer who boarded the British ship Barracouta who retrieved the newspapers that confirmed that the Confederacy was no more.  I'd never heard of him before, but the last name Bulloch was the same as the Confederate purchasing agent in Liverpool, England, who had bought the Alabama and Shenandoah, James Bulloch.  Could they be related?

June 25, 1842-July 14, 1898

Officer in the Confederate States Navy and the youngest officer on the CSS Alabama.  Fired the last shot from the Alabama before the ship sank.

He was the half brother of James Dunwoody Bulloch, so they were.

Also of interest was that Irvine Bulloch was the full brother of socialite Martha Stewart "Mittie" Bulloch, the mother of future U.S. President Theodore "T.R." Roosevelt and paternal grandmother of First Lady Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

--Old B-R'er

The Final Confederate Surrender-- Part 2: A Ship Without a Country

The CSS Shenandoah was now a ship without a country.  It returned to Liverpool and surrendered, hauling down the Confederate flag for the last time on November 6, 1865.

The ship had been purchased for use as a Confederate raider in that city in October 1864.  It was originally named the Sea King and sailed the tea lanes to Bombay.  It was taken to madeira and converted to a commerce raider under the command of Lt. James Iredel Waddell.

The ship was forced to dock in Australia for repairs on a balky propeller for there weeks before embarking on a devastating attack on the North's whaling fleet in the Pacific and Arctic oceans.  On June 10, 1865, it captured 10 whalers.

Five days before that, it had captured the Susan Abigail and found newspapers aboard reporting the fall of Richmond and Lee's surrender.  Things looked bad for their country, but they also saw an article about President Davis imploring for Southerners to carry on with the fight.  So they did.

During their cruise, they captured or sank 38 vessels, captured more than 1,000 men and caused $1.6 million in damage.

Once they found the end of the Confederacy was confirmed, they began their 130-day journey back to Liverpool where they surrendered.

The ship was turned over to the United States by the British government and eventually sold to the Sultan of Zanzibar and renaned the El Majidi before it sank in the Indian Ocean in October 1872.

--Old B-Runner

The Final Confederate Surrender-- Part 1: "Star By Star the Galaxy of Our Flag Had Faded"

From the Nov. 6, 2015, History by Christopher Klein.

On August 2, 1865, the CSS Shenandoah came across a British ship, the bark Barracouta.  Irvine Bulloch, CSN, boarded it and returned with devastating news.  The Confederacy had surrendered, and not recently, but several months earlier.  This was confirmed by newspapers the ship had aboard.

The Shenandoah had been cut off from the outside world as it pillaged the New England whaling fleet in the north Pacific and Arctic oceans.  Some of them had mentioned that the war was over, but that might have just been them trying not to have their ship destroyed.

Now, with it in print, surrender became all too real.

Cornelius Hunt, on the Shenandoah,  sadly wrote:  "Our gallant generals, one after another, had been forced to surrender the armies they had so often led to victory.  State after state had been overrun and occupied by the countless myriads of our enemies.  Star by star the galaxy of our flag had faded, and the Southern Confederacy had ceased to exist."

--Old B-Runner

Gustavus H. Scott-- Part 2: Civil War Service

When the Civil War began, although born in Virginia, he refused to resign his commission and commanded the USS Keystone State and searched for the Confederate raider CSS Sumter.  This was his first command.  Later he joined the West Indies Squadron searching for blockade-runners.

Then he commanded the new gunboat, USS Maratanza and took part in McClellan's Peninsula Campaign.  He captured the CSS Teaser 4 July 1862.

From there he joined the blockade off Wilmington, N.C., 25 September 1862 and at one point fired on Fort Caswell.

Promoted to captain, he took command of the USS DeSoto in the East Gulf Blockading Squadron.  From there,he received command of the USS Canandaigua (the ship that rescued the 150-man crew of the USS Housatonic after it was sunk by the submarine Hunley on Feb. 17, 1864).

He served with the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron until the end of the war and then commanded the USS Saranac of the Pacific Squadron in its search for the Shenandoah.

--Old B-R'er

USS Saranac's Commander, Gustavus H. Scott-- Part 1: Second Seminole War

From Wikipedia.

I read that Gustavus H. Scott commanded the USS Saranac during its search for the CSS Shenandoah.  It turns out he led a long career in the Navy.

1812-1882.

US Navy.  Served in the Second Seminole War and the Civil War, eventually rising to the rank of rear admiral and was once the commander of the North Atlantic squadron.

Born in Virginia 13 June 1812.  Midshipman in 1828 and served on the USS Guerriere in the Pacific Squadron.  he was off Charleston, S.C. during the Nullification Crisis of 1832.  On the USS Vandalia 1835-1836.during the Second Seminole War.

First lieutenant on USS St. Lawrence of the Pacific Squadron 1852-1853.  On the USS Michigan in the Great Lakes 1855-1857 and Lighthouse Inspector 1858-1860.

--Old B-Runner

USS Suwanee-- Part 2

The Suwanee was launched at the Philadelphia Navy Yard and commissioned 23 January 1865>  It cost $171,000.

Ordered to the Pacific on 17 February 1865 and went to New York City and then cruised the Atlantic coast looking for Confederate commerce raiders.

It passed around South America and steamed up its Pacific coast and arrived at Acapulco where it joined the Pacific Squadron.  It was promptly ordered to look for the Shenandoah.

On 9 July 1868, it was wrecked in Shadwell Passage, Queen Charlotte Sound, British Columbia.

--Old B-R'er

The USS Suwanee, the Second Ship Looking for the Shenandoah-- Part 1

From Wikipedia.

i have already written about the USS Saranac, the ship that sent to look for the CSS Shenandoah and may or may not have almost caught the raider in the Atlantic Ocean in the fall of 1865.  The other ship detailed to look for her was the USS Suwanee.

The Suwanee was a third-rate gunboat commissioned late in the war which spent several weeks looking for the CSS Shenandoah.  Like the Saranac, the ship was wrecked off British Columbia, but seven years before in 1868.

It was a double-ender, iron-hulled, sidewheeler built for the U.S. Navy by Reaney, Son & Archbold of Chester, Pennsylvania.  It was 255 feet long and 35-foot beam with a crew of 159.  It mounted ten guns: two 100-pdr. Parrott rifles, four 9-inch Dahlgren smoothbores, two 24-pdr. howitzers and rwo 20-pdr Dahlgren rifles.

--Old B-Runner5

"Last Flag Down": The Final Surrender of the War-- Part 1

From the Nov. 5, 2015, Liverpool (U.K.) Echo "Last Flag Down: the final surrender in the American Civil War happened on the River Mersey.

"The CSS Shenandoah arrived 150 years ago when the flag of the Confederacy was lowered for the last time.

The ship's commander, James Waddell and its crew were all paroled by the British government as all claimed to be American even though 70% of them were British citizens, including several from Liverpool.

James Wells, 71, came from Richmond, Virginia along with thirty other Americans to recreate the lowering of the flag.  They are members of a Confederate organization (SCV I imagine).  Wells has been visiting Liverpool since 2004.

For te past four years he has been endeavoring to recreate this event.

--Old B-Runner

Britain's 290 Foundation

From their site.

On Nov. 7th, I wrote about the 290 Association and its president Ian Dewar as being involved in the ceremony to commemorate the lowering of the Shenandoah's flag.  I'd never heard of them before so did some research.

290 FOUNDATION (BVI) INC.

Their introduction reads in part: "...a charitable enterprise embarked on a voyage of discovery to commemorate those oft-forgotten seamen who served in the navies of the American Civil War.  The foundation borrows its title from Hull #290, a vessel built to the highest standards of British shipbuilding at the John Laird's Shipyard at Birkenhead in the River Mersey.  'Hull #290' would later become known worldwide as the CSS Alabama."

Over 2,600 seamen from great Britain and her empire served on both sides.

Judging from their logo, I'd have to say these gentlemen are more on the Confederate side.  They have a very informative website with lots of information.

--Old B-R'er

The CSS Shenandoah's Ensign

From Wikipedia.

This was the only Confederate flag to circumnavigate the world (even the Alabama didn't do that).  It was the last Confederate flag to be lowered.

And, last week it was once again on display on the 150th anniversary of its "Last Flag Down."

It has been in the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, Virginia, since 1907.

Lt. Dabney (Minor) Scales, CSN, gave the flag to his cousin, Eliza Hull Maury, for safekeeping.  She was the daughter of Richard Launcelot Maury, oldest son of Matthew Fontaine Maury.

Col. Robert Launcelot Maury, CSA, Eliza's brother, brought the flag from England in 1873 and donated it to the museum in 1904.

It measures  88 by 136 inches and is the so-called "Stainless Banner," the Confederacy's Second National Banner.

--Old B-Runner