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Vili Contents

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INTERESTING Memories: Old School Days in Wilmington—Colonel
James G. Burr—The Thalian Association—A Fragmentary
Memory of Johnson Hooper—Joseph Jefferson—Immortality

—The Jenny Lind Incident..........c ccc eee cere eeereeees 238

War BETWEEN THE STATES: On the Eve of Secession—A Capture
Before the War—Early War Times—Changes during the
War—Mrs Armand J. DeRosset—Confederate Heroes—The
Roster of Cape Fear Camp, U. C. V.—Fort Caswell—Fort
8 a Sag (46 84 ETO ES eee 268

BLOCKADE RUNNING: Financial Estimates of Blockade Running—
The Port of Wilmington during the War—Cape Fear Pilots
—Narratives of Distinguished Blockade Runners—Rescue of
Madame DeRosset—Improved Ships and Notable Command-
ers—North Carolina Blockade Runner Advance—Other Ves-
sels Famous in Blockade Running—The Last Days of Block-
ade Running—The Confederate Navy—Wilmington during
the Blockade—The First and Second Attacks upon Fort
Fisher—The Capture of Wilmington—The Use of Torpedoes

in the Cape Fear during the War. .......ccesecccccvessecse 387

PEACE RestTorED: Resumption of Cape Fear Commerce—Trade of
Wilmington, 1815, 1843, 1872—-Cuban Man-of-War Incident—
Board of Commissioners of Navigation and Pilotage—Cape
Fear Aids to Navigation—General Character of the Coast—
United States Revenue-Cutter Service—Cape Fear LifeSav-
ing Service—Use of Oil to Prevent Breaking Seas—Visits of
the Cruiser Raleigh—Federal Government Improvements of
the Upper Cape Fear—Disastrous Fires—The Earthquake of
1886—The Visit of President Taft—Woodrow Wilson’s Youth
in Wilmington—Southport on the Cape Fear—Fort Caswell
at the Present Time—The Proposed Coastal Canal—Munici-
pal Government in Wilmington—The Revolution of 1898—
Cape Fear Newspapers—The Wilmington Bar—Honorable
George Davis, Attorney General of the Confederacy—George
Davis: An Appreciation — The George Davis Monument —
Alfred Moore Waddell: Author— Bishop Robert Strange—
North Carolina Society of Colonial Dames of America—
Places of Historic Interest in North Carolina Relating to the
Colonial Period Yet Unmarked—Luola Murchison Sprunt:
An Appreciation—The Boys’ Brigade—Public Buildings in
Wilmington— Wilmington Churches— Wilmington Schools—
Loyalty of the Cape Fear People to the State University—
The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad—The Seaboard Air Line
Railroad—Hugh MacRae’s Activities—The River Counties—

The Growth of Wilmington—Looking Forward.............. 501

 

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Foreword

From early youth I have loved the Cape Fear River, the
ships and the sailors which it bears upon its bosom. As a boy
I delighted to wander along the wharves where the sailing
ships were moored with their graceful spars and rigging in
relief against the sky-line, with men aloft whose uncouth cries
and unknown tongues inspired me with a longing for the sea,

which I afterwards followed, and for the far-away countries
whence they had come.

In later years, I heard the stories of the old-time Cape Fear
gentlemen, whose memories I revere, and I treasured those
annals of our brave and generous people; I knew all the pilots
of the Cape Fear, whose record of brave deeds and unswerving

loyalty to the Confederacy, under great trial and temptation,
and whose steadfast industry in their dangerous calling are

worthy of all praise; and now, actuated by an earnest desire to
render a public service after many years’ contact with its men
and affairs, I have essayed to write in the following pages a
concise narrative of the sources and tributary streams of the
Cape Fear River, the origin of its name, the development of

its commerce, and the artificial aids to its navigation, with a
few historic incidents of its tidewater region.

The limited scope of this undertaking does not reach beyond
the mere outlines of its romantic, dramatic history, of which
much has been ably written by George Davis, Alfred Moore
Waddell, Samuel A’Court Ashe, and other historians of the
Cape Fear.

I have often looked from my window upon the historie river
and seen the white sails glistening in the morning light, and
when the evening shadows deepened I have gazed upon the wide
expanse resplendent with the glory of the stars and have heard
the sailors in the bay singing “Larboard watch, ahoy!” while
the anchor lights of half a hundred ships were twinkling at
their moorings, and it was something to remember in after
years,

Memory lingers with a certain endearment upon the daily
activities in the harbor in that far-gone day, when the course of

life was more attuned to the placid flow of the river than in this
rushing, jarring time. No more is heard the long-drawn cry of

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