DK - The American Civil War

Confederate Raiders

It was not enough for Southern blockade-runners to elude the U.S. Navy squadrons patrolling

inshore waters around the ports of the Confederacy. Fast and graceful Confederate blockade-runners

and raiders also took to the high seas to circumvent U.S. maritime commerce around the world.

ended one October night in 1864 when,

anchored in the neutral port of Bahia,

Brazil, she was commandeered by

daring Union sailors—while most

of her crew was ashore—and sailed

to the United States.

Unrivaled success

Another legend began life in a Liverpool

shipyard as Hull 290 before sailing for

the Azores in July 1864 as the Enrica.

On August 24, her new captain, the

redeployed Raphael Semmes, hoisted

the Confederate ensign and

commissioned her as CSS Alabama.

The Alabama was the epitome of

the Confederate commerce raider—a

three-masted, bark-rigged sloop-of-war,

When, in June 1861, Captain Raphael

Semmes and CSS Sumter left the

Mississippi River for the Gulf of Mexico,

outrunning the ships of the Union

blockade, he was following Stephen

Mallory’s instructions to “do the

enemy’s commerce the greatest injury

in the shortest time.”

Across the Atlantic in England,

James D. Bulloch, a Confederate agent,

had a similar brief: “Get cruising ships

afloat,” Mallory had told him, “with the

quickest possible dispatch.” While

Semmes made his name in the Sumter,

Bulloch managed to circumvent both

British neutrality laws and U.S.

diplomatic protests to procure 18 ships.

Eleven became blockade-runners,

seven commerce raiders. Three ships

became legends.

The Florida

The first of the legends was built in

Liverpool, England, as the Oreto, but

off a deserted cay in the Bahamas the

ship took on arms and, in August 1862,

became CSS Florida. During the next 14

months, cruising mostly in the West

Indies, Florida took 38 prizes. Her career

BEFORE

Confederate secretary of the Navy, Stephen
Mallory, believed that raids on U.S.
maritime commerce might hurt Northern
business interests, deprive the North of
war material, and weaken the blockade.

THE PRIVATEERING TRADITION
Privateering was a time-honored if not-quite-
honorable practice in use since at least the 16th
century. With a Letter of Marque and Reprisal
issued by a belligerent government, a privately
owned ship could raid enemy commercial
shipping. Captured ships became prizes, subject
to adjudication by a recognized court.
In 1861, the Confederate government issued
Letters of Marque to privateers daring enough to
elude the Federal blockade ❮❮ 72–73. Most
neutral nations, however, refused to allow prizes
to be brought into their ports. The Lincoln
administration, moreover, did not recognize
the Confederacy as a legitimate nation and
threatened to hang its privateers as pirates.
Those willing to run the risk soon discovered that
more money was to be made in blockade-
running, than in privateering.

COMMERCE RAIDERS
Confederate navy secretary Mallory had little
confidence in privateers. The alternative was to
entrust the task to fast naval ships. With no
cruisers, Mallory converted steamships, like
CSS Sumter, and sent agents abroad to
procure, clandestinely, well-designed and
well-armed commerce raiders.

long, sleek, and very fast. She carried

eight guns, and, while capable of 13

knots under both steam and sail, made

most of her captures under sail alone.

In the sea lanes between Newfoundland

and Bermuda and through the West

Indies into the Gulf of Mexico, the

Alabama ravaged U.S. merchant

shipping. She also hunted along the

coasts of Brazil and Africa, and even

sailed across the Indian Ocean to Java

and Singapore.

A raider usually approached her

target flying a British or Dutch ensign,

or flag. Only at close range was the

Confederate ensign run up. Semmes

boarded nearly 450 ships in Alabama’s

two years at sea, 65 of them U.S.

merchantmen or whalers. He burned

most of the ships, but not before

removing their crews, whom he

placed aboard neutral ships or

ashore in neutral ports. At any

given time, up to a dozen Union

The first cruise of the Sumter

This 19th-century lithograph shows the commerce

raider CSS Sumter eluding USS Brooklyn to break

through the Federal blockade at the mouth of

the Mississippi River, on June 30, 1861.

Sailor’s flat cap

The Civil War brought standardization to naval uniforms.

Clothes became practical; fabrics repelled dirt and provided

protection against the elements.