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History
1862-1872
On January 3rd 1861, Georgia
citizens boarded a United States’ Revenue Cutter docked at Savannah. They
seized her in the name of the State of Georgia and imprisoned her crew.
This was over two weeks before the state voted to secede from the Union.
This act of treason marked the beginning of Georgia’s naval involvement in
the war and foreshadowed the important role that Savannah was to play in
the Confederate Navy.
The infant Confederacy faced many problems—one of the more pressing ones
being that the Navy had only a handful of ships—most of which were old,
wooden river steamers lightly built for commercial purposes. In order to
survive, the Confederate Navy would need to borrow, build, buy, or capture
a fleet, and they would have to do it quickly.
The Confederacy assembled a fleet at each major port. Savannah’s was
typical, including any small wooden vessels that could be bought,
commandeered, or built, and large locally-built ironclads. These ragtag
assemblages quickly earned the nickname “mosquito fleets.”
The nature of two of the borrowed and purchased vessels of the Savannah
Squadron was described in a New York newspaper:
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The Rebel Flag of Truce Boats coming
down the Savannah River to meet the Federal Transports
[Click
to Enlarge Photo] |
“The particularly striking
feature of the scene, to my eye, was the grotesque appearance of the rebel
steamers, especially the Swan and the General Lee. Both vessels are great
slab-sided, flat-bottomed affairs, like unsightly houses washed from their
foundations, having three rudders to guide them on account of their
lightness of draught. A spectator at a distance, without being blessed
with a lively imagination, might have supposed these queer specimens of
naval architecture to be floating hearses, the illusion being fostered by
the funeral-like plumes of Cimmerian smoke which waved from their slender
chimneys.”
The quality of vessels built in Savannah for the war effort was in stark
contrast to that of Swan and General Lee. Savannah’s ship building for the
navy was noteworthy. One historian wrote: “No seaport in the Confederacy
turned out more or larger war vessels than Savannah. The work of naval
construction was more energetic and on a larger scale than in any other
Confederate coast city…” When the city fell in 1864, two wooden gunboats
and three ironclads had been completed, one ironclad was within days of
completions, and two more ironclads were on the stocks or planned.
Ironclads were cutting edge naval technology and Savannah was turning them
out in quantity.
In March of 1862, the most
famous naval battle of the war took place at Hampton Roads, Virginia—the
first involving two ironclad warships—Monitor and Virginia (formerly USS
Merrimac). The battle’s outcome made the obsolescence of wooden warships
clear. By summer, many believed that ironclads would win the war for the
Confederacy.
Out of this enthusiasm grew patriotic groups called “Ladies Gunboat
Associations” that raised money for building warships. One such group
formed in Savannah in early 1862 with plans to build an ironclad and
donate her to the cause. Women of Savannah, Augusta, Macon, Milledgeville,
Rome, and other Georgia cities raised over $75,000 of her $115,000 cost.
The rest of the money came from the state.
Confederate troops and ordinary house carpenters built the ship based on a
plan provided by Savannah iron founder Alvin Miller. Her original purpose was to steam to the
mouth of the Savannah River and help Fort Pulaski destroy the blockading
fleet, thus opening Savannah to trade. This was not to be. Fort Pulaski
fell before Georgia was completed and, when launched, the ship was found
to have a major propulsion problem. Her top speed was about 2 knots, while
the river’s current could do four.
The reasons for this problem were many. A timber got stuck
to her bottom during launch, hindering her steering ability. She was
extremely heavy. Her armor included over 500 tons of railroad t-iron. They
considered throwing her coal overboard to lighten her. Her weight made her
bulge at the seams and leak so badly that her pumps ran continuously. One
man described her interior as “a swamp in an iron box.”
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Confederate
Ironclad Ram "Georgia" Lying off Fort Jackson, Savannah River, GA.,
December 1862
[Click
to Enlarge Photo] |
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Adding to her problem was the possibility that her engine may have come
from a sidewheel steamer. Adapting it for use with twin screw propellers
would have meant a big power loss to an already inadequate supply. Her
creators thought she was a failure. One man dubbed her a “mud tub.”
Due to her propulsion problem, she was moored as a floating
battery near Fort Jackson where the river is limited to a single channel.
From there, she could bring a broadside of four well-protected guns to
bear on any vessel that tried to come up the river to Savannah.
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Map of the Evirons
of Savannah, on the South, showing the position of the "Nashville,"
the Ogeechee River, Beulah Battery, and the Present Field of
Operations the "Passaic" and other Ironclads under Commodore Dupont
[Click
to Enlarge Photo] |
Savannah was vulnerable in 1862. The line of river batteries
had not been completed and the other ironclads, which, unlike Georgia,
were built under the direction of skilled naval architects using real
ship’s carpenters, were still under construction.
When the Confederate Navy moored Georgia near Fort Jackson,
they seriously doubted her ability to repel an attack. They were not aware
of her effect on the officers of the Union blockading fleet. Ironclads
were new and untested and there power largely unknown. It was known that
wooden ships were merely an exercise in target practice for them. Rumors
greatly exaggerated this power.
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The Defences of
Savannah-The Rebel Ram Georgia, and obstructions placed in the
Savannah River, at Elba Island, to resist the approach of the Union
Fleet
[Click
to Enlarge Photo] |
The Commander of the blockading fleet wrote in 1862: “…we have been
disturbed by the repeated reports of there being an ironclad ship in the
Savannah River, and for the first time since I took command of this
squadron I have felt a sense of oppression…”
Later, he described his officers: “… Lardner looks 10 years older … the
generals have him worried and his anxiety has been kept up by affairs in
the Savannah River, I think Collins who is there will go crazy next, and
the Captain of the Hale—who I left hale and hearty—is broken down… they
imagine they see ironclad vessels and rams…”
The strategic value of Georgia is shown in an account by a reporter who
saw her from a Union flag of truce boat: “…on rounding a sharp turn, we
came in sight of the obstructions by which the rebels have attempted to
bar our way up to Savannah; above them, and apparently close to them, lay
a nondescript marine monster, which is the ironclad battery Georgia. She
lies there, moored with her broadside down the river, prepared to defend
the narrow passage which is left in the barrier of piles for the ingress
and egress of rebel craft. We steamed up steadily nearer… up to the mouth
of Augustine Creek, …and ever nearer and nearer to the enemy, till at last
an angry flash from the broadside of the Georgia and presently after a
sharp report… warned us that we were far enough.”
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The destruction of
the rebel Ram "Savannah" by the enemy on the even of the federal
occupation of Savannah
[Click
to Enlarge Photo] |
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The Union naval attack never came. The ironclads Georgia
and Savannah, and the river batteries, kept them at bay. It took Sherman’s
army, two years later at the end of its famous “March to the Sea” to take
the city by land.
Georgia was scuttled by her crew and the ironclad Savannah
was blown up to prevent their capture. Most of the remaining vessels of
the Savannah Squadron were torched. Only two wooden vessels—the tug
Sampson and the gunboat Macon—escaped upriver to Augusta.
Georgia went down quickly. An officer noted that he only had time to grab
his saber and sidearm. She went down with everything but her crew, and
they left most of their personal belongings behind.
She lay undisturbed until 1866 when she was dynamited by a Mr. Welles
under a United States Treasury Department contract to clear the river of
obstructions. He succeeded in salvaging only a small portion of her
railroad iron, gave up, and defaulted on his contract. In 1871, the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineers considered removing her, but decided that she was
not a significant obstruction and would be too expensive to remove.
Georgia’s fund raisers, builders, and crew never realized the significant
part she played in delaying the fall of Savannah. Considered a failure and
abandoned in the opaque waters of the Savannah River, she was soon
forgotten. |
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